Cover Up
by GennaJoy
Summary: Rachel and Puck end up playing make believe to cover up insurance fraud after Rachel lends Quinn her health insurance card to help her out. Where will it lead?
1. Chapter 1

**Inspired by, but not written for .Pink's baby challenge (cos Rachel's not actually pregnant in this fic!)**

**I have no idea if this is legally correct!!... but so what, its fiction right!! …Also… I'm ignoring anything after wheels cos it messed up my idea!!... So Quinn's parents don't know about the baby. **

**IN THIS FIC, FINN IS THE BABY DADDY**

"We have to talk" Rachel practically yelled at Quinn in the hallway, their first class of the day hadn't even started.

"About what?" Quinn rolled her eyes, hoping to get past the considerably eccentric midget in front of her. Admittedly she owed Rachel a lot at the moment, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't bring herself to like the girl.

I didn't seem that luck was on her side though, because Rachel grabbed her forcefully by the wrist and dragged her into the girls' bathroom next to their lockers. Quinn groaned as she watched Rachel check all the stalls to make sure no one else was in the bathroom but paid attention when she turned and spoke. "Your doctor" she spat furiously, "called my dad's" and there was a very evident whine of panic in her voice.

Quinn's eyes were as wide as saucers, she felt a wrench in her stomach as shock and nausea began spreading through her body, "what do you mean they called your dads?" the pitch of her voice practically a squeal, "called your dads and told them what?"

"That I'm pregnant" the shorter of the two yelled, nodding her head quickly as a look of disbelief spread across Quinn's face. "Because apparently, in the state of Ohio, doctor patient confidentially doesn't apply to pregnant minors, and they're allowed to inform the parents" her voice getting more shrill.

"Oh my god" Quinn uttered, before looking up quickly, "wait, so what happened? What did they say? What did you say?" she asked, she had never been this frightened in her life.

Rachel's hands flew up to her head, bracing themselves on either side as she tried to slow her thoughts enough to make sense, "I don't know" she admitted, "I panicked, I just sort of went with it." Her eyes bugging out as she tried to explain herself to Quinn, "they must have gotten the call while I was at school, because when I got home they were both there and they just yelled and yelled and yelled and I didn't say anything. I didn't know what would happen if I told the truth so I just said nothing and let them assume everything." She paused, reliving it in her head, grimacing as she gasped, "oh god, my dad cried, I've never seen him cry" she went on, revelling in guilt, "they were so upset, going on and on about how I had let them down and how I'd ruined my life." She stopped, taking a few deep breaths to calm herself down, a tear escaping her eye and trickling down her cheek, she wiped it away furiously.

Quinn's heart ached a little for the girl who'd gone out on a limb for her, only to have the branch break. "So they just let you say nothing?" Quinn clarified; the shock seemed to have numbed her to what was happening.

"They ran out of things to yell at me about, and I wasn't saying anything so they just stormed out of the room" she took another deep breath, steadying herself. "They came and got me for dinner later, but they didn't sit at the table like usual, they took it and sat on the couch, and I didn't know what to do so I just stayed in the kitchen and ate there. They didn't say anything to me all morning."

She sounded so ashamed, and Quinn felt even guiltier, she shouldn't have dumped her pregnancy problems on Rachel, even though Rachel had offered, she should have known better. She sighed, realising that everything was only worse now, "look" she tried to sound sympathetic, "I'll go tell the doctors the truth, and they'll call your parents, and you won't have to worry about it anymore" she resigned herself to her fate.

Rachel looked up at her horrified, "you can't tell anyone what we did," Quinn tried to interject, but Rachel didn't give her the chance. "We committed insurance fraud, we are not confessing anything to anyone" she huffed. "Besides, do you have any idea how much madder my dad's would be if they found out now that I wasn't actually pregnant, or that I was a criminal" she pointed out.

"Yeah, but at some point they're going to figure it out," Quinn spoke as if it weren't obvious, "unless you're planning to actually go and get pregnant, you won't be able to fake it for more than a few months" she joked, although regretting it almost instantly as she wondered just how committed Rachel was to this ploy, after, the girl was crazy.

"So I'll fake it for a few months, and you can get a bit more use out of my insurance card, and when we go to regional's in two months and we're out of town you can help me fake a miscarriage or something" she paused while Quinn stared at her incredulously. "I couldn't sleep last night, so I planned instead; this seemed like the saner of the options I came up with." She explained, before adding sadly, "my dad's might live an alternative lifestyle, but teen pregnancy and health care rip off schemes are not in the same bracket. I can't tell them the truth about any of this, we're in it now, there's no going back."

Quinn even shocked herself when she leaned forwards and wrapped the smaller girl in a hug. As much as she didn't want to admit it, Rachel's decision to keep up the charade had pretty much saved her a huge amount of trouble. Releasing the girl quickly she uttered a quiet, "thankyou" before offering to help her with anything she could. Although she regretted it quickly when a look passed over Rachel's features that told her she would be heavily involved in this scam.

"I need a father" Rachel informed her hurriedly.

Quinn's eyebrows furrowed "you have two dads" she pointed out.

Rachel rolled her eyes, "no" she said, pointing at her stomach, "my baby needs a father" she corrected. "Somewhere between chastising me for wasting all of my talent just so I could end up living in a trailer park working a graveyard shift at a diner and living off food stamps they demanded to know who got me pregnant, only I was too busy crying to talk so they gave up, but they are going to want to know." Rachel sighed and looked almost embarrassed, "and I don't know anyone who is likely to want to become part of an insurance scam for me, except perhaps creepy Jacob, but even he'd just put it in his blog." She hesitated before saying the next part, "I thought that maybe you might be able to think of someone, who'd do it for you? Because no one's going to do it for me."

Quinn took a moment to think, trying to wrack her brain for anyone who enjoyed lying and cheating their way through things, but who also would be willing to do her and Rachel a favour. After a moment only one person came to mind, sadly she knew he really only filled one of the two criteria, but he was probably the best she could do and she doubted he'd dob them in if he wasn't game. She took a look at the emotionally exhausted girl standing in front of her, and sighed, "I've got an idea, meet me in the choir room after second period, ok? I need to think it through a bit first," before she turned on her heel and left to go to the class she was already 15 minutes late for.

**Ok I know there was like NO Rachel and Puck stuff in this chapter, but I was setting up the story, if you actually think I should keep going, please review, and I promise there will be plenty of Puck/Rachel in the next chapter. **


	2. Chapter 2

Rachel pushed open the door to the dark choir room, to find Finn and Quinn sitting on chairs having a hushed conversation. When she entered the room, they both turned and looked at her, Quinn smiled and ushered her over to them, turning back to Finn as the brunette made her way across the room.

"I don't get it, I got a job so we could pay for all the baby stuff" Finn whispered to his girlfriend. Rachel felt a little sorry for Finn, clearly he was trying to do what was needed of him, but he just didn't understand how much this pregnancy was costing.

Quinn looked at him sweetly, "I know, and the moneys helping to pay for all the bills we've already got, but I have new expenses all the time, and we're just not keeping up with it," she explained gently. "Rachel heard me on the phone to the doctors, and offered me her card" she further clarified, before adding "and then everything went nuts."

Rachel pulled over a chair and sat down with the other two, waiting for Quinn to finish explaining before she spoke up, "Umm, I don't really think Finn will work," she told the blonde, and then admitted, "they already know he got you pregnant, I think they'd be about as receptive to him as Ms. Sylvester is of Mr. Shue's hair."

Quinn stared at Rachel horrified, "you've been telling people I'm pregnant?" she fumed, "what if your dads tell my parents?"

Rachel only rolled her eyes, "Quinn, our parents have spoken once, ever" she emphasised the last part, "they met at our 'welcome to high school' PTA dinner at the beginning of freshman year, and your mom told my dads, that every time they fornicated, they killed an angel, so my dads, are not going to tell your parents" she explained.

Quinn huffed a little, "my mother can be a little, forceful" she admitted, "besides" she turned to look back at Finn, "he's not here to be your baby daddy, he's here as emotional blackmail, so we can pull the, 'do it for your best friend' angle if we need to" she smiled, the last hour and a half had given her a chance to put things into action.

Finn cleared his throat meekly, "I don't know if I want to blackmail Puck into this," he admitted, "I mean it's kind of a lot to ask."

"Finn" she stared, using a voice that was somewhere between condescending and sympathetic, "if we get caught," she gestured to herself and Rachel, "we could go to Juvie" she explained, getting the look of horror from him that she had hoped for, "yeah , I could end up, living out my pregnancy in a Juvenile Detention Center."

"At least you wouldn't be a minority anymore," came another voice from the doorway. Having caught only the last part of their conversation, Puck sauntered over, chuckling at his joke as Quinn rolled her eyes in annoyance, looking up at the clock on the wall to check the time.

"You're late" she commented as he took a seat on one of the choir steps next to them all.

He looked up at her unapologetically, "well at least I came, what do you want?" he asked, wondering what on earth possibly warranted his attendance.

"We," she hesitated, not sure the best way to go about this if she really wanted his cooperation, "we, need a favour," short and simple she figured, anything that might get him intrigued.

"When you say 'we,' do you mean the three of you?" he asked, looking confused and a little disgusted at the thought of having to spend much time with any of them. Finn was his best friend, and provided the dude kept his emotions in check when they were hanging out together, they got along well. The girls on the other hand were a different story, Quinn was unpleasant at the best of times, and with the baby hormones added to the mix, she seemed to have sporadic bitch attacks all the time. Also he'd realised since her exile from the Cheerio's, that the mild attraction he'd always had for her, seemed very much tied to sexy uniform, and without the uniform, she was just a seething blond. Rachel on the other hand was bat shit crazy, no one in the world was as scarily unaware of social norms as she was, and while she could behave normally sometimes, the other side of her was just too much to handle. He had to admit though, she on the other hand had not stopped wearing the short miniskirts or the fitted and slightly see through button up shirts, so she had certainly maintained some of her sexy factor. He had also learned from their one week of dating, that her tongue had some impressive qualities, and even though the only place she'd ever used it on him was in his mouth, even that had been sort of worth the slushy.

"Yes" Rachel piped up, "you see, the three of us, have gotten ourselves into a less then desirable situation" Rachel began explaining what it was they had done, but Quinn cut her off and took over, knowing that Rachel's long winded explanation would be enough to scare Puck off in itself.

They were all sitting and staring at him now, having spent the last ten minutes detailing their scheme and his possible role in it. Having finished, they were now waiting for his reaction.

"You're joking right?" he asked, and they all just shook their heads. "Well then you're all morons" he scoffed, "how the hell did you think that would work?"

"Well if my idiotic new doctor hadn't gone and called Rachel's dads, no one would have been the wiser" she spat back at him, before softening. "I know it's a lot to ask, but you'd only have to go and meet Rachel's dads once or twice and get yelled at," she over simplified.

Rachel piped up, "yeah, I mean, if we just tell my dad's that we dated for a bit, which is technically true, and I got pregnant and you're gonna help me out, but we're not together anymore, then they won't expect you to be around all the time" she explained. "And no one at school knows about any of this so it's not like you have to fake anything here, I mean, you don't even have to talk to me at school anymore" she tried to bargain.

"I don't, talk to you at school" he pointed out sullenly, "say I do this, what do I get out of it?" he asked, only mildly intrigued.

"The satisfaction of doing something good for someone else" Quinn said faux sweetly.

He raised his eyebrows as he answered her, "what you're doing isn't good, it's illegal," he pointed out.

Quinn huffed, "fine, it's illegal, it's not like you really care about breaking laws," she said accusingly, but she knew she wouldn't get him to agree using that train of thought and relented, "okay, name your price" she told him. A sly grin spread across his face as he gave both the girls a once over, and she quickly added, "no sexual favours, from either of us, unless berry wants to show you her treasure trail or something" when Rachel scowled at her, she rolled her eyes in a bitchy manner, "what? You're the one who dated him."

"I was actually taking offence to the revival of that nickname," she pointed out, but moved on, turning her attention back to Puck. "So nothing sexual, what else?" she asked him.

He just shook his head, honestly, what did they expect from him? He had no desire to spend any unnecessary time with either of them unless they were going to be naked, or at least clothed but groapable. Although, he suddenly had a thought, and his gaze settled on Rachel, and he could see her getting nervous being the object of his scrutiny, "you have to come meet my mom" he told her. She looked very confused, "she's always giving me crap about how I never date any nice Jewish girls, so you have to come over and meet her a few times so she'll think were dating and leave me alone," he explained, and she nodded excitedly, realising that it was a pretty good bargain. He pointed a finger straight at her, "you have to behave normally though, and when I say normal, I mean normal peoples normal, cos your normal is like normal normal on drugs" he told her, and then had to wait while she grasped what he'd said.

"Fine" she told him, "I'll meet you mom and you'll meet my dads, it's a deal" she held out her hand so he could shake it, and he rolled his eyes at her lameness but accepted the outstretched hand anyway. "But you shouldn't meet my dad's for at least a week I think, hopefully they'll have calmed down a bit by then.

Having agreed on the terms of their agreement, the four of them went back to their regular day, Rachel felt a lot lighter as she realised now that she wasn't going to get caught in a lie, and she had a pretty good chance of pulling the whole thing off. However, when school ended and she realised she had to go home, to a house where she was 'pregnant' and face her dads, she began to wonder how she was going to keep up this charade. Choosing to put off going home as long as possible, she walked to the local library, telling herself she needed books for an assignment, although if she were really being honest with herself then she would admit she could have found the books at the school library. She stayed there until it started getting dark, when she got home it was about 6:30, the house was unlit and no one was home. She turned on all the lights, walking over to the pin board in the kitchen for a note or anything that might tell her where they were. All she found was a post it that said, 'out to dinner, we'll be home late' and it made her a little misty eyed, it wasn't abnormal for them to go out to dinner on a week night, but usually their notes would say something like 'call if you need anything,' with a love heart or a star drawn on it or 'love you sweetheart' written at the bottom. This one just seemed so angry, and she told herself to be strong as she wandered back through the house to her bedroom to do some homework.

Hours later she heard the car pull up in the driveway and the doors open and close, shortly after that, the sound of keys jiggling in the lock and the front door opening, filtered down to her room. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, dread building inside her as she waited for them to come and yell at her more. She heard them move further from the corridor, towards the kitchen, and wondered if they realised she was home. She assumed they must, and were simply choosing to ignore her still. She Lay back on her bed, closing her eyes tight and hoping that they would just leave her be, at least for tonight, she was still too scared to confront them about it. Picking up the book she'd been reading she tried to distract herself, but she didn't have any luck, her heart was beating too rapidly in her chest, and all she wanted to do was get out of the house, be anywhere but here, having to deal with any of this.

She didn't have all that long to panic about it though, because within 15 minutes she could hear her daddy walking down the passage, and she took one last shaky breath as she heard a soft rapping on her door, and she looked up to see him poking his head into her room.

"Mind if I come in?" he asked, sounding sedate. She nodded, feeling her voice would fail her, and he pushed his way into her room, carrying a plate of warmed up left over's in one hand and cutlery in the other. He set them down on her bed and gestured to them, "I didn't know if you'd eaten anything," and she shook her head, picking up the fork to prod at the food, she didn't look up at him when he sat down on the bed. "I don't know what to say to you" he admitted morosely, "we've been out talking about it, and frankly, neither of us knows what to say. I'm just, I don't understand how you possibly ended up in this situation," he told her honestly. "You know so much better than this, you know about birth control, I just can't understand what you were thinking when this happened" he sighed exasperatedly.

"I don't know what I was thinking" she admitted, and it was true, she couldn't for the life of herself remember why she had thought giving Quinn her card was a good idea. Or why she thought it was ok to risk doing all of this to her fathers, but she had and she was stuck in this situation now.

He huffed, " well you're going to have to start thinking now" he warned her, "we're going to need some information, and we need to know what decisions you've made, or haven't made, and we need to meet this boy, I mean, oh god" a thought dawned on him, "it is just one boy right? You know whose baby you're having, don't you?"

Her head snapped up at this, how dare he, "of course I know who the father is, he's my boyfriend" she spat, admittedly it was lie, one she'd promised she wouldn't tell, but she was so angry at the fact her father apparently thought she was a whore that she didn't care.

"Don't get snippy with me young lady" he ordered, standing up so he was towering above her, "I won't apologise for being overwhelmed after finding out that my sixteen year old daughter is pregnant, I wouldn't have a clue what's been going on with you, you certainly never told us you were seeing anyone."

She dropped her head, looking back down at her plate, "maybe you just weren't paying attention," she uttered maliciously under her breath, it wasn't fair to attack him back, she knew that, but she was so hurt and insulted that it was all she could do.

He scoffed, "If that's how you want to behave, you go right ahead and do that, but I'm not impressed, and in a few months your kid won't be either. Things are going to have to change," and with that he turned and walked out of the room, and within seconds of him closing the door there were tears pouring down her face. She felt so conflicted, this was a choice she was making, to help Quinn and Finn and the baby, but she didn't expect it to be so scary. She couldn't fault her dads for feeling the way they did, if she had been looking in on this situation, with only the information they had, she'd have been disappointed in herself as well, but a part of her felt so broken hearted that they weren't being a little more supportive.

She heard the door open, and she looked up, frantically wiping the tears from her cheeks as her other father poked his head in the door. Seeing her like that, she could tell he felt a bit sympathetic, and she half expected him to walk over and wrap his arms around her and tell her it would be ok, and that he was there for her. But he didn't. "This is a lot to process" he told her, and she nodded, tears still escaping her eyes, "and I'm not happy with how you're choosing to deal with this" he said gesturing back towards her father in the other room. His eyes slipped closed for a moment, and when they opened there was a little extra shine on them, "I just wanted to ask, I mean, we wanted to know" he emphasised the 'we', then looked right at her with concern, "you and the baby, your both fine?" he clarified.

She wiped her eyes once more, and nodded, adding "we're fine" and he nodded back to her, before turning around and closing the door behind him.

She put the book down in her lap, burying her face in her hands as she let out one sob after another, she was having a hard time weighing the pros and cons of this particular con. Especially as she began to consider the fact, that even in all their heart break and disappointment, they still wanted to know that she and 'her' baby were going to be ok. It made her feel so guilty because she knew that in two months time, this baby was going to 'die.'

She pulled her phone out, letting the tears run more freely down her cheeks now that there was no one there to watch her. She found Quinn's number and her finger rested over the call button, but she didn't want to dump all of this on Quinn, even if the girl owed her, the girl was going through her own hell at the moment. She considered Finn for an instant before deciding that it wasn't appropriate to call him, and that only left one person, she scrolled back up through the phone to Noah's number, and pressed dial, not giving herself the chance to reconsider.

The phone rang four times before she heard the line click through, and his disinterested answer came down the line, "hi Berry." She didn't say anything for a moment, pursing her lips together and letting her eyes tighten as she warded off a sob. "Rachel?" his voice filtered through again, this time a hint of concern mixed into it, she opened her mouth to speak, letting out a loud sniffle. "Are you ok?" he asked, definite concern flooding through him now.

"No" she whispered quietly, letting a sob fall out with her words, "I feel like the worst person in the world" she confessed.

He took a deep breath, steadying himself before speaking, he wasn't used to dealing with emotional girls. "You're doing it all for a good reason though," he reminded her, "your helping someone, that's a decent thing to do."

"Yeah, but my dad's," she sniffled, "they're so disappointed, it's like I broke their hearts" and she couldn't hold back the next run of tears.

Listening to her sob over the phone, he made a decision, one he wasn't sure about, but he did it anyway, "I'm coming over, ok?" he told her, it was phrased as a question, but it wasn't, he knew she needed him, and even if he was only being a fake dad, he wasn't going to be a crap fake dad.

"You can't" she sounded panicked as she tried to convince him not to come over.

There was no point though; he was already half way out his bed room door. "I'll be there in ten minutes" he told her, but understanding her worry he added, "Open your bedroom window, they won't even know I'm there," and then he hung up on her, slipping out though the laundry so as to not alert his mother to his actions.

She listened to the dial tone for a moment, before sliding the phone closed and walking over to the window. She pushed it open, and even though the night air was a bit crisp, the cool breeze that hit her headachy tear stained face was somewhat soothing. She picked up her sweater from the end of her bed, pulling it over her head as she picked up the plate of uneaten food and put it on her desk, out of the way. She quietly pushed her way out of her bed room, she could hear the TV and her father's talking over the top of it, about her, as she walked over to the bathroom to splash some water on her face before creeping back. She turned the lights off, letting the street lights and moonlight from outside the window cast shadows across the room, before she lay down on her bed, facing her door, watching, just in case someone should dare enter. She let her eyes slide shut, begging them to stop spilling over with salt water as she waited for him to get there. She was actually glad that he was coming, as callous as he was at school, she knew he wasn't really a monster, she had learnt that herself.

A short time later she heard a gentle 'thud thud' as his feet which had swung across the window frame hit the floor, and she felt her mattress shift underneath her as he crawled across it to lie behind her. Far enough away to respect her personal space, but close enough that he could reach out and rub his hand along her arm. She rolled onto her back, turning her head to look at him, and he was lost for words. There were fresh tears resting on her cheeks and her eyes looked bloodshot and red as if she'd been crying for days. He really didn't know what to say to her, he didn't know her dads, so he couldn't tell her they'd forgive her, for all he knew her fathers were tyrannical assholes, although he doubted that. So he said what he did know, "At the end of the day, when Quinn's baby doesn't have like extra fingers and toes cos your insurance paid for her baby medicine, you're gonna be really glad you did this, even if your dads are mad now," he told her, and even though there were still new tears dripping down her face she did laugh a little. "Is there anything I can do?" and part of him mentally kicked his own ass, cos he was burying himself a lot deeper in this then he had intended to.

She smiled softly, "can I have a hug?" she asked, having wanted someone to just wrap her up in their arms since her dad had walked out the room. He nodded and slid a little awkwardly closer to her, not sure if he should sit up and giver her one or just lie there with her, he couldn't tell if one was enough or if the other was too much. She didn't give him long to think it through though, because as he moved over to her, she rolled closer and nestled in beside him, her head sitting in his shoulder, her arm slung tightly across his chest. So he wrapped one arm around her back, holding her close as the other lay across his own body entwined with hers. When her sobs had all but stopped, his hand travelled up her back, and rested in her hair, running it through his fingers, but he regretted it quickly as his thoughts strayed to a place where it was ok that her shampoo smelt nice and her hair was soft, and that she made little noises when he massaged her scalp. He stopped his thoughts almost as quickly as they started, reminding himself that this was Rachel Berry, who he hadn't even been able to stand for a week and who had just roped him into illegal activities, but his actions didn't stop.

After a while she felt so comforted by him that she looked up at him, from her position on his chest and admitted, "I know I'm not really pregnant, but in some ways, it almost feels real, because of how serious everything is."

He chuckled a little, and her eyebrows furrowed in confusion, "I was thinking something similar before you called" he confessed, "I just couldn't stop thinking about it, all afternoon, I'd try to concentrate on something else, and my thoughts would keep coming back to you and Quinn and Finn and the baby, and the fake baby," he prodded her stomach. "And how your dads aren't going to know what we know when we talk to them, so they're going to be really mad" he paused, milling though it in his head. "I'm sure it'd be heaps worse if you really were pregnant, I'm not saying it's the same thing, but it's still weirdly stressful," she nodded into his chest understanding entirely where he was coming from.

After a while he looked down at her poking her gently in the back as he went on, "you on the other hand, it's probably worse for you then if it were real. I mean Quinn's really pregnant and her folks don't have a clue, they're still walking around, acting as if the sun shines out her ass and here you're getting all this crap over a lie" he scoffed.

He lay with her for a while, running his fingers through her hair until he felt her shiver, the first time he figured it was just because she was enjoying his ministrations, but when she did it again, and moved the arm on his chest closer to her body he realised it was because she was cold. So he sat up on the bed, effectively pulling her with him. When he turned to her, her face was hardly more than an inch away, and he could feel his own breath bouncing back off her cheek, "I'm uhhh, I'm going to shut the window, it's kind of cold" he told her, sliding away from her.

"You know, you can go now if you want," she told him quietly. Without him there beside her, she suddenly remembered that he was him and she was her, and that even though he was being super nice to her, he was probably bored shitless and wanted to go home.

"Nah," he said moving back to the bed, kicking off his shoes as he walked over, "it's late, I think I'll just stay here" he told her confidently.

She considered pointing out to him that she hadn't actually invited him to stay then night, or that she hadn't even invited him over. However, it occurred to her that she was going to have to tell him the next day that she'd informed her father's that they were dating even though she'd promised not to. So perhaps letting him get a little familiar first might not be such a bad idea, besides, he'd been unexpectedly comforting, he'd made her feel safe and she'd really needed that. So she shrugged as he climbed into bed, and excused herself to go and put her pyjamas on, opting for a pair of shorts and a clingy singlet over her kitten nighty, wondering as she left the room, if she had been imagining the little sparks between them.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thank you for all the lovely reviews, I REALLY REALLY appreciate each one of them, and I love hearing what you're thinking!! I hope you enjoy this chapter, let me know what you think of it!!**

She had had a terrible night of sleep, although, she knew that had he not been there, she'd have slept worse. She had woken over and over again, and every time she'd been a little shocked to find that even though he was asleep he was being a total gentleman. Her eyes would flutter open, and that heavy feeling of impending dread would dawn on her again, and sink down into her chest. Had she been alone, that probably would have been enough to have her crying herself back to sleep, but with him there, on the other side of her bed, she felt a little less scared.

He had kept his distance all night, keeping his hands to himself, so she had been somewhat apprehensive to move to close to him to begin with. The first time she woke, she had turned to stare at him, just watching him breath until she had drifted off again. The second time she had woken, his hand had been resting next to his head on his pillow, and she had felt so unsettled that she craved something to hold onto. So she had very slowly reached out, and gingerly placed her small hand into his big one, she had held her breath as the contact made him stir, but when he turned towards her he was still deep asleep, and he pulled their entwined hands into his chest, and this time she fell asleep feeling his heart beat. The third time she had woken with tears already in her eyes, a nightmare about her father's disowning her had woken her, so she rolled in close to him, not caring that she jostled him as she did. Part of her was hoping he'd wake up and make her feel better, but he stayed fast asleep, and instead she settled for the fact that her hand was still firmly in his grasp and the side of her body was pushed up against his chest, enjoying the feel of his breath brushing across her forehead with every rise and fall of his body.

When she woke the fourth time, she knew she must have been crying fairly loudly in her sleep, because even though she was facing away from him, she knew he was awake. His big body was spooning hers, his hand rubbing her arm gently as he tried to calm her down, placing little kisses into her hair, and she didn't dare turn around, because this wasn't the Noah she knew. Sure he had been sweet to her before, but not like this, this was a whole different side of him, one she was shocked existed, and she had no intention of turning around and confronting him about it, in case she scared it out of him.

She had barely drifted off the last time when her morning alarm went off, letting her know that it was 6:30 am and she was due to get out of bed and start her daily routine. She groaned, and shrunk into him, although she quickly regretted that action, as he leaned over her to thwack her alarm off. In a state of half sleep he put little effort into keeping his weight off her, and as he momentarily squashed her under his body, she was quite shocked by just how big he actually was.

"You're squashing me" she whined as she pushed him back off her.

He grunted a response to her actions as he rubbed his eyes, "chill out, it's not like you're really preggo" he pointed out gruffly, and she could see that 'early morning Noah' was very similar to 'slushie facial Noah.'

She sat up in bed, closing her eyes in irritation as the familiar feeling of dread settled back in, and she dropped her head onto her knees as she wondered hopelessly if this feeling would last until the miscarriage, or worse, longer.

Sensing her distress, he reached over and put a hand on the back that was facing him, causing her to turn and give him her attention. "You alright?" he asked, he wasn't too concerned, she wasn't crying and blubbering like she had been last night.

She smiled at him meekly for asking, before turning back to look at her bedroom door, "I know avoidance isn't healthy, but I can't seem to help it, it's what I want." She sighed, "I just don't want to have to see them or talk to them, I don't want to have to be here" she gestured at her bedroom.

"So don't be" he said as if it were the simplest thing in the world, and she gave him a look as if to say, _'yeah, cos it's that easy'_ but he didn't relent. "If you don't wanna see them right now then don't, grab a bag of stuff and climb out the window, you can deal with them later" he reasoned.

She smiled at him condescendingly, "I respect my fathers, I don't want to make anything worse" she told him matter of factly.

"You really think that things can get worse?" he asked, disbelievingly.

"Yes" she huffed indignantly, " I mean it's bad enough that they already think that some boyfriend I haven't even brought home has gone and gotten me pregnant, I don't want to sneak around behind their backs as well."

"Boyfriend?" he deadpanned.

She gave him a guilty glance, realising that she hadn't meant to tell him that, well at least not that way, "I'm sorry, it just slipped out last night," she confessed. When he didn't look at all understanding she added pissily, "my daddy implied I was a whore," as if it were explanation enough.

He rolled his eyes at her, "so what you're telling me is that you don't want to further anger the man who called his sixteen year old daughter a slut and made her feel like the world's biggest disappointment?" he asked unbelievingly. She nodded slightly, she knew what he was trying to do, but she had to admit that when it was said like that, she felt less sympathy for her dad. "Because I thought that decent fathers were supposed to support their kids even when they made mistakes and weren't perfect" he egged her on more. "If you ask me, your dad should look in the mirror next time he's dolling advice on how you should or shouldn't be behaving, cos from the sound of it he's a hypocrite."

"My daddy, not my dad" she corrected him.

"Whatever" he countered, "your daddy," he used the word cynically, "sounds like a knob, I say you should make him feel as crap as he's making you feel, disappear for a few days and let him stew til he feels nice and guilty that he drove you away and then when you come home he'll be nicer" he told her, grinning smugly as if he'd just concocted the best plan ever.

She gave him a look of disapproval, "I can't disappear for a few days, they'd call the police" she told him seriously, but he could hear the waver of temptation in her voice, and his grin grew.

"So just disappear for the day, put some clothes on and we'll get out of here" he told her, trying to sound a bit more comforting, if he were being honest with himself he would admit that he was actually getting a thrill out of trying to convert Rachel Berry to the dark side. Especially because he knew that if she really did jump out the window and run off with him for the day then he'd have a whole new respect for her, plus it'd be proof that his badassness was so powerful he could 'reform' anyone!

"I can't get dressed, I haven't had a shower" she told him, and he did an internal victory dance as he realised he'd won.

"Who cares, you can have a shower at mine later, just put on something that you can go get breakfast in" he instructed, climbing out of bed himself and grabbing his shoes to put them back on.

She hesitated for a moment, looking stricken with guilt, but eventually she climbed out of bed slowly and walked over to her wardrobe, she pulled out a simple pink skirt, one that went with the white singlet top she was already wearing and stepped into it, zipping it up around her waist before sliding her pj shorts out from under it. She quickly grabbed another outfit from the wardrobe and folded it neatly, putting it down on her unmade bed, before walking over to her vanity and scooping up a small assortment of makeup essentials, dropping them into a little makeup bag that she put with the clothing. He'd finished with his shoes by this point and he watched her as she slid her feet into a pair of flats and shoved some books into her school bag, before carefully finding space for the possessions she'd placed on the bed. She looked up at him when she was done, as if waiting for instruction on what to do next.

"You ready?" he asked, gesturing to her bag, and she nodded her response, "cool, let's go" he walked over to the window, swinging it open and turning to take her bag from her.

"Shouldn't I leave a note or something?" she asked, looking back at her desk, "I don't want them to panic and think I ran away or anything" she stuttered out.

"Fine, but make it short" he grumbled, honestly, if she were running away she'd have taken a lot more than one outfit, her dads weren't that stupid, but he couldn't be bothered fighting her on it. She was clearly torn about it, and a part of him really wanted to be able to pull her out the window with him and keep enjoying their secret (and fake) relationship.

She wandered over to her desk and pulled a pad of paper out of a draw, scribbling something on it, pausing when she was done to reread it to make sure it was ok. He walked over to inspect what she had written. "_Dad and Daddy, I've gone for breakfast with a friend, I'm so sorry about last night, I promise we'll talk about it when I get home after school, Love Rachel_" and she had drawn a little star next to her name.

He grunted in disgust as he read the note over her shoulder, reaching around her to grab the pad and rip the top sheet off it. She yelped in protest, but he scrunched the sheet up and shoved it in his pocket, handing the paper back to her, "just write, '_I'm at Puck's, I'll see you tonight after dinner'_, no love Rachel crap and no fruity stars" he told her. Her look of irritation changed to one of confusion as he mentioned dinner, and he sighed and explained, "you're meeting my mom, that was the deal remember. You may as well come over tonight. That way you can come home afterwards and make your dads feel all guilty that my mom is cool with it and they'll feel like crap parents" he explained, suddenly adding, "we're not actually gonna tell her about any of the baby stuff obviously, but they don't need to know that". She wondered who exactly had screwed him up so badly that he honestly thought this level of manipulation was cunning as opposed to diabolically evil, but chose to just keep scowling at him until he poked her in the ribs, ordering her to write what he'd dictated.

"Don't be ridiculous, I have to explain what's going on, I'm writing the same thing" she said as she dropped the pad back onto her desk and hunched over it to write the note again. He groaned in irritation, reaching back around her to steal the pad back again.

"I'll do it if you're going to be such a pansy" he told her pushing her away. She gave him the chance to write the note, mildly curious about what he'd choose to say. "_Dear Rachel's dads, just came over for a bit of an early morning go-round with Rach, if you know what I mean, and then figured we should probably go back to my place so her screams of pleasure didn't wake you. Hope you have a good day, we certainly will with the way we started it! I'll return the sex kitten tonight, I promise she'll be nice and tired!! Noah Puckerman. P.S. Do you have any idea how horny pregnancy hormones make chicks, it's a shame your both gay, you don't have a clue what your missing out on!_" He laughed heartily as he gave it back to her and watched her horrified expression as she read it.

"That is so vulgar" she chastisized him, smacking him in the chest with the pad before pulling the sheet off, turning away from him so he wouldn't see the smile creeping up on her face as she admitted to herself that it was a little funny. "Fine, I'll write something different" she huffed, and bent over the paper again, holding it up so he could read it and approve when she was finished. "_At Noah's, I'll be home later_" it read, "simple enough?" she asked watching his face screw up at the use of his first name, "my father's will think it's weird if I don't use your actual name" she commented as she put it back down on the table, "also, I don't if you've ever noticed, but I never really call you Puck anyway". He had noticed, it had started back when they had dated for all of about five minutes, he'd thought it was really annoying at first, that she HAD to be different from everyone else. Over the short time though, he'd kinda started to like it, he felt like it showed that they were comfortable with each other and that what they were doing was mature enough that they used real names not high school nick names. It had been one of the things he actually missed after they broke up, and he liked it that she did still call him that on the rare occasions when they talked.

"Yeah, whatever" he said dismissing what she'd said as if he didn't care. Satisfied enough with the note, he bent down and grabbed her school bag before directing her to the window by her shoulders. He dropped the bag on the other side of the window frame, and quickly jumped through himself, before turning and helping her down, his thoughts straying over the fact that it felt nice to have his hands on either side of her body, lowering her to the ground. Also enjoying the fact that as he let her go, he let one of his hands brush past her braless breast. He saw the dirty glance that she gave him, but carried on as if he hadn't, pretending casually that he hadn't even realised he'd touched her. He picked her bag up again and took her by the hand, leading her across the lawn to where his truck was parked, unlocking the door and helping her in. She wondered as she waited for him to round the vehicle to the driver's side, why it was that his hands holding her body had sent shivers through her, and why his hand taking hers had made her stomach flip. Sure, she wasn't above admitting that Noah was very attractive, but she couldn't understand why he was having this effect on her. They had dated in the past and he'd never made her feel this way, and to top it off, they were in the middle of a highly illegal scam, she had more important things to do then daydream about boys. She wondered whether it was simply that the act of him coming over last night, and helping her escape her dads this morning had just made him seem like a dream guy. After all she was physically tired and emotionally exhausted and she wasn't thinking straight. So she decided on the spot that she wouldn't let this momentary attraction affect her, it would pass as her life got less stressful and she didn't want to act on anything now that she would regret later.

Still she couldn't help it though, when he climbed into the cab beside her, she waited for him to start driving before she let her eyes settle on him, taking in his sexy body while he was too preoccupied to notice, or at least, she thought he was.

**I know it was short… but its kind of a two parter, and a lot of the next chapter is already written, so please review and let me know what you think, and I'll try to have the next chapter up in the next couple of days!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Thank you so much for the reviews!... I love them and they mean so much to me!!**

**Ok so I'm sorta over saying fake pregnancy, and fake baby, you know its fake, I know its fake, and the way I'm feeling about Rachel and Puck is that they know its fake but they're starting to enjoy pretending its real because they're enjoying some of the side effects of the fake from now on its mostly just gonna be, 'the baby' or 'the pregnancy,'etc.**

She hadn't eaten breakfast in a diner in years, she was pretty sure the last time she had, would have been when she and her dads had road tripped to New York for her 13th birthday. She had gotten food poisoning from one of the places she had eaten at on the way home, and what should have been a three hour drive from Akron to Lima had turned into 6 hours because she had vomited the whole way. Needless to say diners made her a little queasy. So when she had found herself sitting in a diner booth across from Noah she had been surprised to say the least, but he had picked the place because it was halfway between her house and his and she hadn't wanted to be rude.

She was ravenous, she had hardly eaten the night before, and so her stomach was rumbling while they sat and waited for their food to come. The drive had been mostly silent, and he hadn't said much since they'd arrived, he wasn't one to talk a lot. To her, that was both a blessing and a curse, on one hand, Rachel liked conversation, it made her feel comfortable, so when he just sat there silently it made her feel uneasy, but on the other hand, she supposed that when he did talk it was usually worth listening to, he was either funny or meaningful or admittedly menacing, but he knew what he was saying. Unlike Finn who often just talked for the sake of it, poor sweet Finn, who was one of the nicest guys she knew. Her heart would swell whenever she saw him, and it made her tummy flutter when he did nice things for her, like open a door or lend her a pencil, but then he would talk, and she'd remember how dim he was. Still there was just enough of her that was still in love with him that she did it over and over again.

She let her thoughts drift away from Finn and back to her current situation, placing a hand on her stomach as she felt it rumble angrily. She saw Noah's gaze follow her hand, and she wished she could tell what he was thinking. With her hand placed where it was, she wondered if she looked at all like a girl who had just found out she was pregnant, wether the way she held her self would be enough of a clue to some observant spectator that she was 'with child.' She considered the fact that it might be smart to start paying attention to things like that, so that when around her father's she'd not do anything to give away the fact that it was all a sham. She let her fingers draw small patterns over her abdomen as she began to think about what else she would need as proof for her fathers. Wanting a second opinion she looked up at the boy sitting across from her, who's attention had turned to a fancy car outside the window.

"Do you think I should get pre-natal vitamins?" she asked him, and his head snapped back around to look at her, an inquisitive look on his face. "I mean, you can just buy them over the counter, and I'm sure that at some point my fathers are going to want to know what I'm taking to make sure the baby is healthy" she elaborated.

"I dunno," he shrugged, "are they expensive?" he asked, really not having a clue what to think about pre-natal vitamins.

"I don't think so" she shrugged, "and it doesn't have to be wasteful , I mean I could actually take them, it's not like they're bad for you if you're not pregnant, it's sort of like a targeted multivitamin" she'd seen them in the drugstore before, sitting next to rows upon rows of herbal supplements and homeopathic remedies.

He still really wasn't sure, but she seemed to want his opinion, "I guess you may as well then" he told her, "we could go past a pharmacy on the way home, or on the way to school" he offered.

She smiled back at him, pleased that he was being involved, but shook her head, "I'm sure it can wait until tomorrow" she told him. Sure it had only just gone 7:00 am, but they still had to eat, and go back to his place, and both shower and dress to be at school by 8:45, and that was going to be tight enough as it was. She was also factoring in the reality that Noah rarely showed up for school before second period, and that was just not going to be an option for her, so she was going to have to push just to make sure they got there on time.

Just as she was about to explain her reasoning the waitress came over, carrying their food, and Rachel smiled at her appreciatively as she accepted her plate. "I'm famished" she told Noah as she started eating a large mouthful of food. The waitress gave her an entertained look, which went unnoticed by Rachel, although that wasn't really shocking, Rachel didn't notice most things.

Noah took his plate from the young woman who was still watching Rachel eat, and smirked as he got an idea in his head. If he were going to have to pretend to be an expectant father, he may as well start practicing. He looked up at the intrigued lady and wondered if he could convince her of what they were going to have to convince others of later. He gestured to Rachel with his fork, the movement catching the waitress's eye, he looked up at her, a smile on his face and said quietly, "she's eating for two."

The woman's smile broadened as she heard the news, but from across the table Rachel made a sound symbolising something in-between horror and choking. She swallowed quickly and her eyes went wide, "Noah" she chided him angrily, wondering what on earth he was thinking spreading the fact that she was 'pregnant' around town.

The poor waitress looked back and forwards between them, clearly worried she'd just stepped into an argument, "don't worry" he told the standing woman, "we are happy about it, we just haven't really told that many people" he informed her, smiling brightly at her and then Rachel, as if encouraging her to go along with it.

"Yeah, I mean, it's not really the ideal situation" Rachel agreed with him, still looking a little hesitant, "we don't really want everyone to know just yet, I mean my parents took it" she paused trying to find the right way to phrase it, "well, they aren't talking to me," she explained.

"I'm sure they'll come around" said the woman, 'Sarah' her name tag read, "my parents did" she told them brightly, and Rachel's head snapped up in attention. "I got pregnant the night of my high school graduation," she told them, laughing a little at the cliché. "My parents were so mad, but they accepted it after a while, the shock can be a lot to get over, but if having this baby is what you want, I'm sure they'll respect that" she smiled as she told them the story, and Noah noticed how wide Rachel's eyes had gone as she stared up at the woman in awe.

"So you had your baby while you were still a teenager?" he asked, wanting her to go on, his plan had worked better then he'd hoped, if this woman could convince Rachel that things would be alright then he probably wouldn't have to do as much of it himself.

"Yeah" she affirmed, "I mean she's four now" the woman added, a proud smile spreading across her face, "and her little sister is nearly 7 months" she added excitedly, and Rachel's smile grew brighter, here was this happy young woman, who couldn't be more then about 23 and she had two kids, and she had survived. Sarah looked down at Rachel as if reading her thoughts, "Its not always easy," she warned gently, "kids are a big commitment, they take a lot of energy and strength" she pointed out. However, she added quickly, "They're such a blessing though, you'll never love anything as much" she smiled before laughing a little, "not even this one with his really cool haircut" she gestured at Puck, who ran his hand over his Mohawk while Rachel giggled.

"Maybe I'll change it when the baby's born" he said, only because he knew full well this baby wasn't going to be born, but since no one else knew he may as well play the kind and thoughtful guy.

"No" Rachel actually sounded a little offended by the suggestion, "I like your hair like that" she told him, and the waitress laughed.

"Really?" he asked unbelievingly, he should have been annoyed by that, the whole point of the haircut was that people didn't like it, but in a way he liked that she liked it.

"Yeah," her thoughts flooded back to that day she had washed slushy out of his hair, "it feels really nice" she told him, a hint of seduction in her voice as she watched him smile. She could remember the way the strip of soft hair had felt when she'd combed her fingers through it, and the way the prickly stubble had tickled the pads of her fingers while she'd massaged his head. She'd enjoyed sitting on his sturdy leg and having his hand rest on her thigh, and good god, it hit her again just how sexy he was, and how easily he could turn her on. She could hardly believe that she was actually sitting across the table from him, getting to play house, well not house, but defiantly playing something. Even if it was all a lie, if it meant she got more breakfasts and more coy glances and more opportunities to flirt with him without any fall out, she was so fine with lying.

Rachel turned her attention back to the woman, blushing a little that she had said something even mildly suggestive in front of her. However, Sarah simply gave her a knowing glance before telling her, "I hope everything works out well for you, if you ever need some advice or anything, I'm here for the breakfast shift Monday through Thursday, don't hesitate, k?" the woman offered.

Rachel beamed up at her, "yeah, thank you" she said sincerely. Noah just smiled at the woman as she walked away, before turning his attention back to Rachel, who in turn had gone back to her breakfast. She looked up suddenly though, and he could see a hint of unrest in her eyes, "is it bad that I'm starting to not feel so bad about lying to people?" she asked, clearly over thinking things again, "I mean, I just feel like I'm getting kind of used to it, and it's not bothering me so much anymore."

He rolled his eyes a little, "so now you're feeling guilty about not feeling guilty?" he asked her, and she nodded sheepishly. "Rachel, we're not actually hurting anyone, I mean sure we're stressing your dads out a bit, but they'll live, and we aren't doing it to be malicious" he pointed out, "besides you can't be good all the time, no one can" he added.

"Mother Teresa was good all the time," she told him, smiling a little as she baited him.

"Mother Teresa didn't know what she was missing out on," he said gesturing to himself, and she laughed at his smugness.

She gave him a coy glance as she went back to cutting up her waffles, "are you saying I'm going to get something out of spending time with you?" she asked.

He's grin just grew, and he let his eyes roam over her as he thought about all the things he'd happily do to her if she let him. "I dunno," he teased, "maybe if you keep not wearing a bra you'll find out" he told her. She rolled her eyes at him, but the meaning was somewhat lost as her smile was still in place. Her thoughts strayed to the people at school, she wondered if they would notice if she wore a bra or not, maybe it would be ok on the days she wore a sweater vest or one of her argyle cardigans, because it would be less obvious, but she had a feeling he'd notice.

They chatted about the baby and her dads and his family while they finished their breakfast, and he noted that he was actually really enjoying spending time with her, because maybe she wasn't as nuts as he thought. She was just very determined, and obsessive and talkative, and who was he kidding, she WAS as nuts as he thought she was, she was crackerjack crazy, but he was starting to get used to it, and he grimaced internally as he wondered whether he was perhaps starting to find her insanity endearing.

She was enjoying how he was starting to open up to her a bit, not about anything particularly important, but more so that he seemed comfortable around her, to be totally honest she was kind of proud of the fact that she wasn't driving him totally crazy. She played along with him, still confused about whether he was genuinely enjoying her company or if it was more an act for the benefit of their appearance, she had a feeling it was starting to become the former and that made her just a little giddy. So she did what she thought normal people would do, because she had a feeling if she followed her own instincts and just started blurting irrationally about what she felt and if he felt the same thing, he'd run so fast that all he'd leave behind would be a cloud of dust. Normal to her was pouting when he stole some of her waffles and taking some of his bacon when he offered it as an apology. When she told him he had food on his face and he only managed to wipe part of it off, she leaned over and wiped off the rest. When he made jokes that she understood she laughed at them, and when he made jokes she didn't understand she believed him when he told her she didn't really want to know what they were about because they were TOO vulgar for her.

When she caught their waitress Sarah watching them a few times, she was glad to see the young woman smiling. It made her proud in two ways, one was that clearly she was sitting eating breakfast with one of the sexiest boys at McKinley high, but the second reason was that she (and him) we're clearly pulling off the act, because she was such a good actress that she could play a pregnant teen in love. She honestly wasn't sure which made her prouder, and that scared her a bit, because a few weeks ago she'd have known, and now she was falling under the spell of the schools most notorious womaniser. No matter how hard she tried though, she couldn't help but enjoy his attention, so when he wrapped an arm around her shoulder as they made their way across the parking lot towards her car, she just gave up. She leaned into him, wrapping an arm around his waist loosely as she relished the fact that he smelled like a mixture between his deodorant left over from the day before and her perfume that he'd no doubt picked up off her sheets. She decided that it was probably one of the best fragrances ever.

As they pulled up in front of his house she noticed the lack of car in the drive way, "your moms not home?" she asked, feeling a little relieved, she had been expecting to have to sneak into his house as he had done hers.

His eyes flitted to the driveway also, double checking what he already knew, "nah, she's been working a lot of early shifts at the hospital, so she drops Abbey at our cousins on her way to work" he told her, putting the car in park and turning the engine off.

"That's convenient" she commented as she opened the door and jumped out, he made it around to her quick enough to relieve her of the duty of closing her own door, trying to be a bit chivalrous without being too obvious. He took her hand again as he led her towards the house, and it was only then that he realised, though he'd been to her house several times, he'd never brought her here. His hand hesitated as he pushed the key in the lock, pausing for a moment, he turned to her, "my house isn't like your house," he told her, "it's not all fancy and stuff, and its kinda messy" he admitted somewhat ashamedly.

She looked at him a little perplexed, "Noah, I've been to your house before" she told him.

"No you haven't" he almost laughed.

"Yeah I have," she countered, in that very Rachel-esque, I-know-what-I'm-talking-about kind of way.

He didn't even hesitate, they'd only lived in this house for four years, and if she'd been in it he'd have remembered the day his home got invaded by a mad woman, but he still asked anyway, "and when was that?"

"Well, we were still in Junior High" he knew for a fact that he hadn't gone to the same junior high as Rachel. When he had started junior high they had still been living in the house that his dad had owned, and it was way across town in a different school district, so he went to a school over there. So when they moved house, he chose to stay at the school he was already at, meaning he didn't meet most of the kids he knew now until he'd started at McKinley. "Your mom and her partner at the time threw a pre-sader dinner gathering" she continued on, and he started to remember the night she was referring to. "And my dad worked with the guy she was seeing, so he invited us all, but I was sick" and that's when it clicked. There had been these two guys who showed up with a tiny girl (honestly she was really small, he'd actually thought she was a couple of years younger than him) and the girl had been so sick that moment he saw her he was sure she was gonna hurl. She'd fallen asleep on the couch after about 10 minutes and his mom had put her in his bed, so she'd be comfortable. He'd actually forgotten she was up there until his mom had made him take her some ice cream with melted snickers bars on it for desert and he agreed to do it only cos it meant he would be able to eat half of it on his way up the stairs.

She'd stopped recounting the evening when she'd seen the realisation dawn on his face, "remember?" she asked.

"Yeah I guess" he admitted as he actually opened the door and allowed her inside. "I can't believe you remember that, you practically slept the whole evening" he told her.

"Well I remember being angry, because when I woke up and I actually felt like I could probably stomach something, you'd eaten most of my ice cream" she teased, as she wandered inside, seeing that certain furniture had moved, but it still had a similar look to what she remembered.

"I didn't eat your ice cream" he replied far too quickly, and she turned and gave him her most disbelieving look, "what, I didn't" he reaffirmed more forcefully.

She rolled her eyes, "you had chocolate on your shirt when you walked in" she told him and turned back away from him, towards the stairs.

"Maybe that was from my ice cream" he told her in a '_bet you never thought of that_' voice.

"My spoon had creamy mouth smears on it" she rebutted.

A smile spread across his face as he realised he could either fess up or keep teasing her, it was so easy, "maybe I was lazy when I was washing them, we didn't have a dishwasher when we first moved in here you know." He couldn't help but chuckle as she spun around mid way up the stairs, a fierce look on her face, ready to win the argument.

As soon as she saw his grin though, she let out a huff, "fine, you didn't eat my ice cream," she told him, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of working her up.

He laughed again, moving up a few more steps, til he was standing on the one below hers. Their faces were almost aligned, his was still slightly higher than hers, a grin spread across his face as he said "nah, I did, and it was really good."

She hit him gently on his chest, pursing her lips in an attempt to hide a smile, "you're insurmountable" she told him, before turning and heading father up the stairs.

"You only said that because you thought I wouldn't understand it" he claimed, following her and enjoying the view as she walked a few steps higher than him.

"I said it because it's true" she corrected him, "and you **don't** know what it means."

He let her shower first, because even though he had a feeling she would take longer than him (which was correct) he also had a feeling she'd have more appearance stuff to do to herself afterwards then he would (that too was correct). So he watched TV with the volume down while he waited for her to come out, wondering while he listened to her sing in the shower if she did it; simply out of habit, because she knew he could hear her or both of the above. When she came out, wrapped in her towel with her damp hair clinging to her neck and chest, he mentally kicked himself for having given her one of his big bath sheets as opposed to one of his sisters little towels that would have stopped mid-thigh.

He left her to go and have his own shower, and she waited until she heard the shower start to get changed. She glanced around his room, wanting to be a sticky beak and look at all his things, but deciding that she should probably dress quickly in case he had really fast showers and tried to come back in while she was half naked.

Once clothed she perused the knick knacks on his desk and dresser while she towel dried her hair. She smiled at what she assumed had been a carefully selected photo of him sitting with his mom on a hospital bed, staring in wonder at the baby she held in her arms. His dad not shockingly wasn't in the photo, she had noticed that his father seemed to be quite a sore spot and assumed that part of the reason he had thrown himself into this cover up in such a committed manner had a lot to do with his own personal experiences of his mother having to cope alone.

She jumped a little when he knocked on the door, stepping away from the personal items and busying herself with putting on socks before she told him he could enter.

They spent the remainder of the morning in relative silence, he noticed that they seemed quite good at going about their daily preparations without getting in each other's way and he kinda thought it was cool how comfortable they were around each other. He'd been enjoying her company so much all morning that he didn't even protest when she dragged him out of the house almost an hour before he would usually leave. He decided she wasn't the biggest stickler though when she agreed to go past a gas station on the way even though they were cutting it fine as it was. So when he bought himself a chupa chup he got her a frozen coke as a reward for being cool, but also because he sorta wanted to see what she was like caffeinated, because he had a feeling it would be entertaining. He was sadly disappointed when he gave it to her though, because when she thanked him for it she also informed him that it would replace one of the several cups of coffee she that usually consumed before coming to school, though he recognised that her insane caffeine consumption explained a lot about her. In an embarrassing moment that could have been stolen from a chick flick because it was so cutesy romantic, he promised to bring her caffine in the mornings because he knew that now her father's thought she was pregnant she wouldn't be able to drink coffee around them anymore. In an attempt to wipe the dreamy smile off her face, he covered, by telling her that if she wanted to drink coffee at home all she had to do, was tell them she was hoping the caffeine would stunt the baby's growth so she wouldn't get stretch marks from carrying some massive foetus around in her womb. It worked, but even though it did, he admitted to himself that he'd probably still show up at school tomorrow with another frozen coke for her.

When they arrived at school less than 10 minutes later he was kinda freaked out that she'd drunk the entire beverage before they got there, wondering how exactly she'd managed to avoid a brain freeze. He felt like a douche though, because when he asked her about it she told him pointedly, "I've had ice cold beverages thrown my face since the first day of high school Noah, I've built up a tolerance." So he apologised for being an ass to her in the past, again, and she sweetly accepted his apology, again, telling him he was forgiven because he hadn't done it to her in a while. He couldn't really stop himself for feeling like a jerk though, so when some of the lacrosse players started yelling insults at her while they walked through the parking lot, he shoved one of them into a car before telling them all in no uncertain terms to go to town on their mothers.

"You don't have to do that for me" she told him as he walked back over to her, but he just shrugged, so she added, "the deal was that no one at school would have to know, and you're kind of giving some of it away," but internally she was doing a happy dance, because she had never had a boy defend her honour before.

"Who cares" he replied, "let them think what they want," and he smiled at her in a slightly suggestive way as he fished his forgotten chupa chup out of his pocket. As they walked through the front doors of McKinley he half expected it to be kind of like a movie, where everyone stopped and stared at them, but it wasn't. He chalked it up to a combination of the fact that they had already gotten that reaction about a month previous, and the fact that because he was still doing glee, about half the student body probably never realised they'd broken up.

"Ughh" he made a guttural sound of disgust, "this thing tastes like crap" he said as he pulled the lollypop out of his mouth, planning to toss it in the next bin he walked past.

"It smells good" she told him absently, and he knew that even though a comment like that coming from anyone else would have been flirting, from her it was just truth.

It didn't mean he couldn't have some fun with it though, flirting with Rachel was entertaining, mainly because most of the time she didn't get it, and it was kinda hilarious the stuff he could say and get away with. However, it was also kind of just fun to flirt with her cos she was a girl, and she was fairly hot, and he knew that even as annoying (or not so annoying) as she was, he'd do her if he got the chance. Finally there was also the fact that Santana and Brittany were walking a few feet behind them, eves dropping on their conversation in an attempt to work out why they had shown up to school together, and a little part of him just didn't want to pass up the chance to make Santana jealous, after all, the cow had dumped him in the middle of a school hallway.

So he turned to Rachel, smiling coyly before asking her, "you want it?" and she looked up at him a little confused, he waved the lollypop in front of her, "its grape." He didn't even need to point out that he knew it was her favourite, the smile that appeared on her face was enough to inform him and their followers that she was glad he had remembered.

Although when she looked back down at the lollypop in his hand, her nose wrinkled and her expression changed to one of indecisiveness, "it has your spit on it" she commented.

He laughed, taking the last few steps before they were standing in front of her locker, he stopped walking and pushed her gently so her back was against the metal, he leaned forwards placing a soft kiss on her lips, before running his sugary tongue across her bottom lip. He pulled away before she had the chance to open her mouth for him, and took another step towards her, so his body was practically pushed right up against hers, forcing her to tilt her head back so she could look up at his face. "Now your mouth has my spit on it" he whispered to her, his saccharine breath fogging up her thoughts.

She sighed deeply before giving herself a 'snap out of it, you're Rachel Berry, and Rachel Berry does not melt for boys' mind slap, reverting to a more casual version of herself she simply said, "ok, I'll have it" and shrugged. She held her hand out to take it from him, but instead he held it up to her face so she could take it with her mouth, which to his surprise she did. He smiled proudly as he watched her grin impishly at him, he couldn't quite tell if that look was one that was actually meant she was flirting back at him, or just that she liked the lollypop. That was another thing he was beginning to like about Rachel, the fact that she was kinda a challenge, but she was exciting to try and figure out.

He left her at her locker and snuck a look back at her, smiling a little as he saw the seething cheerleader that was no longer paying attention to him, but was bitching to her blonde friend. When his focus landed on Rachel though, he knew he wouldn't be able to get the image of her out of his head all day, enjoying the clenching feeling low down in his abdomen as he watched her pull the grape lolly out of her mouth with a pop, running her tongue over her lips and smacking them together before replacing it in her mouth and opening her locker door.

She stood, staring absently at her books, wondering if he was just playing with her, kissing her as part of some game he was using to fill in boredom, or if he had genuinely wanted to kiss her and just seen an opportunity. She hated that she was so bad at reading human interactions, especially her own. There was a reason she explained almost every thought that ran through her head out loud, it was so people didn't get the wrong idea, which she was sadly very good at giving. As the day filtered past, she wondered just how much of the chemistry they seemed to have had all morning had been imagined and how much had been real. She tried to convince herself that she surely couldn't have made it ALL up. Deciding that the only way to really work it out was to try and act aloof (but not crazy) for the rest of the day, and see how he treated her when she wasn't prompting his affections.

**So I'm crazy tired atm, so apologise for any typos that have slipped past me (there's probably heaps)… but I wanted to get it out to you before I went to bed!... please review and let me know what you thought about the chapter!**


	5. Chapter 5

**So not a whole lot happens in this chapter plot wise, but meh, I just started writing and this is how it ended up. I hope you like it! Please review!!**

"Hey, Rachel" he called after her as she walked down the hallway.

She turned and watched him jog over to her, reminding herself to act neutral as he got closer, she had a plan, and if she wanted to know how he felt she was going to have to stick to it.

He expected her to start talking as soon as he got to her because she usually didn't give him too much of a chance to speak. So when she just stood silently and expectantly waiting for him to say something it actually took him by surprise. "I uhhh.." he trailed off, distracted enough by her silence to forget what he needed to tell her.

"Yes?" she prompted, just smiling politely as she waited for him to talk.

"Uhh, I uhh, OH" he suddenly remembered, " I wanted to tell you that I have football practice after school, so you could wait and then come home with me, or if you wanna go back to your place I can pick you up after I'm done." He explained.

She thought it was sweet that he'd bother to run the options by her, "I'll wait" she told him, "I don't wanna go home, I mean not until I have to" she told him.

He sensed that what she really meant was, 'I don't wanna go home ever again," but he decided to just go with it, now was not the time or place to get into another discussion about her fathers. "Sure, well I finish at five, so ummm, I could meet you in the library or the auditorium or the choir room or something?" he offered hesitantly, not entirely sure how all of this was going to go.

"How about I just meet you at your car?" she offered, not actually knowing what she'd do with her spare time, or where she'd end up.

He smiled, "sure, that sounds easy" he told her, "I'll see you then" and he wandered off, whether he headed to the nurses' station or actually to a class she wasn't sure. She tried not to worry too much about the lack of physical contact, he hadn't touched her or hugged her or kissed her goodbye. He'd kissed her in front of the whole school (and Santana) earlier, so he wasn't shy, if he wanted to touch her he would have. Another part of her reasoned that he hadn't had a need, and only people in gross clingy relationship had to handle each other every chance they got, it didn't mean he wasn't interested in her. Not that it mattered, she reminded herself, they were all in the middle of a rather precarious situation, crushes and lustful thoughts were not appropriate. Still, she wanted to know if he was having similar feelings, so that's why she had a plan.

She spent the rest of the day trying to strengthen her resilience to his charm, imagining dinner scenarios in her head, and finding ways to act completely unaffected by him. Admittedly a lot of her imaginary scenarios ended with them laying horizontal on his bed, tongues entwined, hands a-groping, but she felt she'd do better in the moment.

---

When Coach had called an end to training, he'd sprinted back to the locker rooms, showered so fast he wasn't even sure it was sanitary, dressed himself whist still damp and avoided all of the guys' conversations. Part of him was arguing that it was just rude to let someone wait for you too long, and the other part had given up the fight, having already admitted he just wanted to go hang out with none other than the ever insane Rachel Berry. As he got to the parking lot he slowed down, not wanting to look like an overeager tool. As he walked towards his truck he could already see her sitting on his bonnet, and he chided himself for not having given her the car keys so she could have at least sat on the seats. When he got closer to her though, she seemed to look happy enough as she was. When she finally looked up and saw him coming over to her she smiled and pulled her iPod headphones out of her ears, and he could see she was holding a paper bag in her hands.

"What you got there?" He asked when he got to her, they were the only people in the car park, everyone else had either left school for the day or were still finishing their post-practice activities. She made no attempt to get down from her perch so he dropped his bags next to the door and leaned his forearms on the bonnet next to her.

"I was hungry," she explained, "so I went to the shop around the corner" she said offering him the bag. He opened it and his face lit up as he saw the donuts inside. Admittedly she knew that bringing him treats was in a way going against her plan, but she really had been hungry and it would have been rude not to get him something too.

He pulled out a sugar dusted one and took a big bite out of it, "wha er you lisnin too?" he asked through his mouthful.

Rachel grimaced at the sight of his food, and wiped off some sugar that had landed on his top, "I'm not wearing underwear today," she told him without thinking.

He made a choking noise and then his face turned red as he started coughed violently, he spat the half chewed food out onto the ground as he took a few deep breaths, "what? Why not?" suddenly wondering if she was turning into the freaky stalker version of herself. He had gone into full panic mode, chiding himself for having let his guard down when she started laughing.

It was a gentle laugh at first, a look of honest entertainment splashed across her face, but when his expression of horror didn't change, she got louder, clutching a hand to her stomach as she crumbled into hysterical cackling.

As she calmed down he asked her seriously, "how could you not wear underwear? You're wearing a skirt" he told her in a whisper, even though there was no one around them. When he pushed her knees closer together she couldn't help but let out another snort of laughter.

"No" she said as she tried to regain her breath, "I'm Not Wearing Underwear Today, is a song from a musical," she fished her iPod back out of her bag, switching it on and showing him the screen. "You asked me what I was listening to" she reminded him, a look of utter enjoyment on her face.

"Avenue Q?" he asked her, "what the hell kind of musical is this?" he gave her back the iPod before he bent over and fished his water bottle out of his gym bag. He took a big gulp in an effort to recover properly from his inhalation accident and then took another, smaller bite of his donut, careful to chew it properly.

"It's got puppets" she told him, and got a 'WTF' look in response, "it's like an R rated version of Sesame Street, but with better music" she finished.

He rolled his eyes at her while shaking his head, "I have a feeling that you did that on purpose" he told her. "You know, it's not nice to kill the father of your baby" he countered when she started laughing again.

"You think I tried to kill you with a donut?" she asked him, questioning his little faith in her methods.

"A donut and your womanly wiles" he corrected her, having finished his first donut he pulled out the second, a chocolate iced one, not hesitating before he stated eating that one too.

She reached out, grabbing his wrist and guiding it closer to herself so she could take a bite of the donut. "I thought you didn't like sharing things that had already been in my mouth," he mocked her.

Unlike him, she finished chewing and swallowing before she spoke, "well that was until you salivated all over my mouth, and after that I realised that I was already going to get any herpes you may or may not have, so why not enjoy the perks. You know, a lollypop, a donut, pissing off Santana" she listed said perks on her fingers.

He looked at the ground humbly, he hadn't realised that Rachel had known Santana was watching them when he kissed her. He didn't want her to think he'd only done it because he was trying to make another girl jealous, but he also felt like it was admitting a lot to tell her he'd done it because he liked her, and he wasn't sure he was ready for that yet. He was torn between two sides of reasoning, one was that she'd been gawking at him and mooning over him all morning, so it wasn't like she'd reject him if he confessed, but another part of him wondered if maybe she really was just that good an actress and maybe she wasn't really that interested. After all, she'd been in love with Finn forever, how could one night of cuddling and a shared morning really change that? Although it had certainly changed a lot for him.

Not being able to decide whether to tell her how he felt or not, he chose to say something that was a bit of both, "don't forget the frozen coke" he pointed out to her. The subtext being: _I don't buy drinks for just anyone_, though he was quite sure she missed it and it made him feel a little guilty. "So do you wanna go then?" he asked as he started to notice some of the other football players wandering out into the parking lot, he wanted to get away with her before Finn emerged.

"Sure" she agreed, zipping her bag before moving to jump off the bonnet.

In an attempt to prove to her that he did kinda like her, he wrapped an arm around her waist and slid her off his truck, making sure to put her down gently in front of him. He opened her door and helped her into the cab, before dumping his bags in the tray and heading around the truck. He could see Finn in the rear view mirror as he drove out the school gates, but he was pretty sure that the oafy boy hadn't seen Rachel in his car, he hoped that was the case, because he really didn't feel like having a 'what are your intentions towards her' conversation the next day.

"So does your mom know I'm coming for dinner?" she asked, and he thought he could hear just a hint of unease in her voice, "because, I mean, walking into your house and saying, "hi I'm Rachel, your son's good Jewish girlfriend, who you've never heard about or met before, because I'm not actually a friend of his, in fact he kinda hated me until a few weeks ago, but you have a lovely home, and it's nice to meet you" seems somewhat an inadequate introduction" she pointed out, and then took a deep breath to compensate for the very long one liner.

"I didn't hate you" he said defensively, he wasn't sure why the truth bothered him so much, but it did, he didn't want her to feel like that anymore. It drove him nuts how guilty he felt about the way he'd treated her in the past, he seemed unable accept it and move on like she did.

"You didn't hate me?" she said slowly and disbelievingly.

"Fine, I hated you, but why make a point of it?" god, did he sound almost whiny right now?

"I didn't mean it like that, I'm not insulting you, I'm just stating a fact, you hated me, I hated you, now we're fake dating, some is bound to notice and think it's strange" she reiterated.

"Yeah" he agreed, lost in his thoughts for a moment, "I don't hate you anymore" he threw out suddenly.

She smiled a little, liking that her plan was starting to work, _no prompting_ she reminded herself, "ok" she nodded along, as nonchalantly as she could manage.

He took the indifference to mean that she didn't believe him, and now he really felt like crap, he shouldn't have kissed her for the first time in front of Santana, first time again, whatever. He should have made it private and important, so she wouldn't be sitting here now, thinking that he was just using her because he could, because she owed him. He pulled the car over, and she turned to look at him, confusion etched across her face, "I mean it," he told her seriously, "I know I'm a douche bag to you most of the time, but I don't hate you, you're actually a lot more fun than I thought you would be" he confessed, smiling to convince her.

She chuckled, "that's nice of you to say," she said noncommittally on purpose, and watched as his mind churned, she could see it on his face that he wasn't convinced she believed him, and that was just how she wanted it, she wanted him to prove it to her.

Clearly though, he could tell that his sudden confession hadn't done the trick, and if he wanted her to believe that he wanted them to be friends or possibly more, he'd have to find another way to show her he really meant it. He turned his attention back to the road, and pulled out into the traffic, there wasn't any conversation until Rachel piped up suddenly.

"Do you actually know what a douche bag is?" she asked, "because you seem to use the term quite a bit," it was all just conversation filler.

"Uhh, no, I guess not, what is it?" she laughed at his response.

"You don't want to know" when he turned to argue that he did she added, "trust me, really, you don't, but stop saying it, cos it's gross."

"Well you have to tell me now, I'm a guy, I love gross things," he tried to convince her.

An evil look spread across her face, "fine, if you really want to know I'll tell you. A douche bag is…"

Five minutes later they pulled up at his house, and she was laughing under her breath at the expression on his face, "ok, you were right, I did NOT want to know what it was." It only made her laugh harder, but he could see how it was funny from her point of view, she had warned him. So he scowled at her jokingly and climbed out of the cab, moving faster than he had that morning, he got to her just as her door swung open. Even though there was a step that she could use to climb down, he planted a hand on each side of her waist and lifted her down, careful to drop her a little so she fell a bit further into his arms. He leaned around her to grab her bag from the seat, upper body brushing upper body, and he enjoyed the little sigh that she probably thought was quiet enough to get away with.

As they walked towards the house, she stopped suddenly, "wait, you never answered me," she told him, and his expression made it clear that he had forgotten the question to which she was referring, "does your mom know I'm coming?" she reminded him.

"Yeah, I asked her last night if it was cool," and it seemed to calm her down.

Though a moment later she stopped again, "wait, you asked her if what was 'cool'? That you bring a friend, or you bring a girlfriend?" she double checked.

He rubbed a hand down his face as he sighed, "I asked if I could have someone over for dinner, and she asked if I was bringing a girl, and I said yes, so she asked if it was my girlfriend, and I said I didn't know yet. So that's what she knows," he filled her in.

"So I'm your 'I don't know'?" she clarified.

He rolled his eyes at her obsessivness, "yes, you're my 'I don't know'," he said as they finally got all the way across the front yard to the door. He pondered that fact that even though they were actually referring to the lie they were telling his mother, the concept of uncertainty in their relationship was in fact very similar. Sure they hadn't really admitted anything to each other, or officially gone on any dates, but Rachel being his 'I don't know' was quite fitting.

They walked into the house, which seemed much more alive than it had in the morning, the lights were on, even though it was still bright outside, adding an extra glow to all the rooms, there was music playing and a kid's movie running on the TV in the next room. Rachel could smell food being cooked, and she almost did a double take at how different the house felt when it wasn't just her and Noah keeping silent company.

"Mom?" he yelled into the house, dumping his sports bag on the way, but holding onto his and her school bags, (he had refused to let her carry her own).

"Yes?" his mother looked up as they walked into the kitchen. Rachel had never felt this nervous in her life, she could stand on a stage in front of thousands and belt it out, and it wouldn't have bothered her, but this had her scared. She trailed behind him into the kitchen, and she could see his mom look at her and smile, from where she stood, half hidden by his form. She tugged a little at the bottom of her skirt, wishing she'd thought it through and picked something a bit longer, or pants, god why hadn't she worn pants today.

She didn't get much longer to think about it though, so she plastered a smile on her face, and went into actress mode. Noah turned to her, took her by the hand and walked her closer to his mother, "This is Rachel" he told his mom simply, then turned to Rachel, "this is my mom" he said, as if that were all that was needed for an introduction.

His mother huffed and gave him a little push out of the way, "honestly where did you learn proper etiquette? What do you want her to do, walk around calling me mom all night?" she turned her attention to Rachel, "I'm Deborah." She chuckled a little as she shook Rachel's hand, and the younger of the two let out an internal sigh of relief, that this woman was still as kind as she had remembered. "It's lovely to meet you, I've heard a bit about you" the older woman admitted and Noah cringed visibly, not quite able to recall some of the things he'd said about Rachel in the past, but quite positive that most of it probably hadn't been positive.

As Rachel's attention turned to him, she had one questioning eyebrow raised, and in an attempt to avoid that whole debacle, he changed the subject. "Mom, you've met Rachel before" he informed her.

"When?" Deborah threw him a confused look, "I certainly recognise Rachel from your concert, you're very talented sweetheart" she added to Rachel, "but I didn't meet her there."

"Mom, we've been through this, it was an invitational, not a concert" he said limply.

His mother rolled her eyes, turning to Rachel she explained, "he thinks 'concert' sounds, and I quote, _fruity_" she laughed at her sons angered face.

Rachel giggled and turned to Noah, "An invitational is most certainly a concert, you big fruit."

When he shot daggers at his mother for having brought it up she responded sensibly, "why bring her over if you didn't want me to embarrass you in front of her?"

He groaned and stomped out of the room, "whenever the two of you are done teasing me, I'll be in my room, doing homework." His mother snorted at the mention of homework, "what? I do homework" but his mother just kept laughing.

"Of course you do sweetheart," she called after him, clearly not at all honestly.

"Well I do, do homework" Rachel assured Puck's mom, "so I should probably…" she trailed off, pointing in the direction Puck had left in, "it's lovely to meet you again, dinner smells fantastic" she chimed, _flattery will get you everywhere_, she reminded herself.

Noah's mother smiled back at her, "Thank you, it's nothing fancy," just as Rachel turned to leave, she spoke again, "umm, when was the first time? Uh, that I met you" she asked, "Noah didn't say exactly"

"Seder dinner," Rachel told her simply, but had to elaborate, "I was sick, I came with my dads," she saw the recognition spark in the woman's eyes at the mention of two fathers. Rachel sometimes hated that her parents were such a unique and defining quality, but then again, Deborah Puckerman, had probably only once had two gay men with a daughter as guests in her home.

"Oh of course, I remember now, lord, you were very sick that night," she agreed as she ushered Rachel out of the room, she pointed to the stairs, "Noahs room is the second on the right, in case you don't remember from that night" she informed the younger girl.

Rachel thanked Noah's mom, choosing not to point out that she had in fact remembered from that night about two and a half years previous, or that even if she hadn't, she'd been in his room that morning, naked.

She walked up to his room, to find him lying face down across the bed, their bags dropped haphazardly next to the door. "You look tired" she pointed out, as she picked up her back pack, and came to sit next to him cross legged on the bed.

He turned his head to face her, "yeah, well this week, coach has adopted the 'if you don't want to kill yourself, you haven't trained hard enough yet" theory that Ms. Sylvester is a fan of, only difference being that we suck," he explained.

"You aren't that bad" she countered, as she pulled some books out of her bag.

"Have you ever actually come to a game?" he asked, honestly unsure.

She gave him a guilty look, caught in her lie, she decided to point out, "no, but I've seen you practice, you all look very snazzy in your uniforms."

He chuckled, "yeah, cos that's what football is about, looking snazzy."

"Well at least if you're going to play terribly you look good doing it" she pointed out the silver lining.

He rolled over onto his back, sliding his hands under his head as a pillow, "you think I look good?" he teased her, waggling his eyebrows as he asked.

_YES_ her head screamed, but instead she just huffed that he was abusing her compliment, and pulled one of her books in front of her, "we have a Spanish test on Monday, so we could go through some verbs together?" she offered, not terribly hopeful about his participation, aware that his mother was probably right, because why would he study when he never even showed up to class.

He raised his eyebrows at her suggestively again, "which verbs did you have in mind?" he laughed at her annoyed facial expression until she hit him in the stomach with her text book. "Ok, ok, sorry, give me the book and I'll quiz you" he told her, snatching the book from her hands and surprisingly flipping to the correct page. "Ok, bailar?" he asked, and then waited for her response.

"Uh, dance" she answered hesitantly.

"Yep, nadar?" he gave her another.

"Swim" she seemed surer about this one.

"Ok, I'll tell if that's right if you give me a back massage," he bargained, "my back is really sore from training."

She scowled at him, "I already know that one's right" she told him confidently.

He looked at the book, double checking, "it's not" he told her, trying to bait her into giving him a massage.

"Yes it is" her confidence was wavering, she couldn't tell if he was lying to her to get a back rub or if she'd really gotten it wrong. Admittedly she hadn't paid that much attention in Spanish today, she'd been too busy picturing, well, something very similar to a back rub, but with less clothes.

He looked at the book again, "it's really not," holding the book on the other side of him as she made a grab for it.

She got a very indignant look on her face, and she'd looked so cute that he'd had to reel himself in and remind himself, that if he did this right, he could have her hands on his body within the next ten minutes. "Fine, I'll get yours," she said as she jumped off the bed, walking back over to his bag by the door and unzipping it. When she looked up at him he was sitting, and he had a very entertained look on his face, "you have no books in here" she commented. He nodded smugly, "you just have a collection of rubbish in here, why do you have a plate in your school bag?" she asked as she pulled out a plate covered in what looked like well cemented bread crumbs.

"I ate breakfast in my truck the other day" he said as if it were completely normal.

"So why did you put it in your bag? It's not like you didn't drive your truck home again" she said, putting the plate down on his bedside table.

"I dunno, I figured I'd be more likely to remember it this way" he answered.

"Well that clearly didn't work" she pointed out as she held the bag open and peered into it some more, before making a disgusted face and putting it back down, "I don't even want to know what else is in there."

She wandered back over to the bed, kicking off her shoes this time, "fine, roll over, I'll do your back" she conceded, and he gave her another dirty look. She pointed a finger at him in an irritated fashion, "ok we don't even have the right parts for you to make that sexual" she told him as he lay on his stomach, and propped himself up by his elbows, with the book in front of him.

"I can make anything sexual" he told her proudly as he turned his head to look at her. She settled herself on her knees right next to him, "you sure you don't want to climb on?" he asked teasingly.

She took a deep breath so as not to snap at him, "I'm fine here" she replied as she stated rubbing her thumbs over his lower neck muscles.

"I can take my top off if you want" he offered, he was enjoying stirring her up. He liked that they had gotten along so well, and that she seemed to have relaxed into a milder version of herself, now that she was comfortable around him. It was a version that was actually a lot pleasanter and funnier than her usual high strung self. However, he knew from experience that pissed off Rachel was also pretty funny in a very different way, and a little more spontaneous.

"That won't be necessary" she told him cooly, "so if it's not swim, what is nadar?" she asked, although she was about 90% sure it was and he'd just lied to get her to do what she was doing now.

He completely ignored her question, "or you could take your top off if you want?"

Her hands stilled in irritation, "and how would that help anything?" she asked, starting to let the frustration creep into her voice, act neutral her ass, she might not be prompting him, but he was certainly baiting her.

"I don't know" he said, turning his head to smile at her, "but it would be nice?" it was phrased as a question, as if to say _so will you do it?_

She scowled at him more, letting her thumb painfully dig into one of his tender muscles, so he'd relented and told her the truth. They kept up the routine for about 20 minutes, until his muscles had been tended to and he'd gotten bored, and then they'd ended up watching a movie for the next hour or so until dinner had been ready. Rachel had almost been sad to go downstairs to eat, she'd been enjoying the closeness she'd been feeling to him emotionally, some of which was caused by their closeness physically.

With his laptop sitting at the end of the bed they'd situated themselves so she was sitting with her back against the headboard, and her legs stretched out in front of her. He on the other hand was lying flat on his back, his head, propped up by a pillow, was in line with her lap. She'd watched as the hand that he'd flung across her legs at the start of the film had started subconsciously playing with the tops of her knee highs, pulling at the wool blend, and letting it drop back on to her legs repetitively.

She'd anxiously let her hand drop down near his head, pretending to have done it without thinking, only to innocently notice how fuzzy his head felt. She had a vantage point from where she was sitting, it was easier for her to watch him then it was for him to watch her. She'd noticed his eyes twitch as her hand had moved against his skin, and in an attempt to make it seem totally unintentional she'd pulled her hand back and made a comment about "it feels so bizarre."

She'd waited until he'd rubbed his own fingertips against, as if to test it out, his eyes flicked up to look at her face, "feels normal to me," he said obviously.

It was then that she put her hand back where it had been, and ran her fingers over the patch that he probably hadn't shaved in a few days. "Well I think it feels weird" she reiterated, as her fingers continued to move across his head. Un-protested by him, she'd kept it up until they'd been called down for dinner, thoroughly enjoying the feel of his hair under her fingertips, and enjoying the way he let her continue what she felt was an action usually associated to a much more familiar relationship then the one they shared.

Dinner in his opinion had been a hit. As regular as she had been around him for the last day, there had still been a lining of her usual Rachel Berry flavour of crazy, however, at dinner she really had been normal normal, with a flourish of awesome. He'd hated that the whole way through the meal her attention had been ping ponging between his mother who wanted to know everything about her. Especially her attention to religious detail, and then to his sister who had wanted to tell Rachel every (very) insignificant aspect about her own life, down to the fact that there were two other girls with the same name in her grade, but she was the only Abbey whose name was spelt with an 'e'. At one point he'd stretched his legs out under the table, so that their sock covered feet, were, for a lack of better terms, playing footsies. He was aware that it was particularly lame, but then again, Rachel liked lame, and he had wanted to remind her that he was there too, it was a way to get her attention without stealing it. He'd smiled right at her when she'd noticed what he was doing and had stretched her own legs out so that her feet could rest up against his, sometimes moving them to overlap.

At precisely 9:08pm he'd put his truck into park as they sat outside her house, "sorry we didn't finish the movie" he told her lamely, not sure what else to say. His mother had a rule that it wasn't appropriate for him to have someone over after nine on a weeknight. So he'd begrudgingly driven her home (the long way), feeling guilty as he'd watched her out of the corner of his eye getting more and more tense as they neared her house.

She took a deep breath before turning to him, "thank you for today, and for yesterday, well, last night," she rambled.

She picked her bag up off the cab floor, and moved to pull on the door handle, "hey Rach," he said, stopping her. She liked that he used her first name more often now, and that he shortened it, no one else did that, except occasionally Mr. Shue, but she had a feeling that he did it because he felt sorry for her that she had no real friends. "Don't let them stress you out too much ok?" he told her seriously, before adding on a lighter note, "It's bad for the baby" she laughed a little.

"I'm not very good at standing up to them" she confessed, and he could see the uncertainty in her eyes. It pissed him off, because the Rachel Berry he knew was a crazed self defender, she knew what she wanted and she wouldn't dare let anyone tell her what to do.

An idea came over him, "you remember in glee practice how Kurt told you that high waisted skirts were unflattering on you because they made you look short?" she nodded her head. "Right, well remember how you put him in his place by telling him it didn't matter how gay he was, it's never fashionable to wear ankle freezers" she nodded again. "So just remember that feeling, put all your frustration into your words, you'll be totally badass, your dads won't even stand a chance."

"Ok" she assured him, "I'll try, I mean, my fathers are a little like Kurt sometimes, too gay for their own good," she clarified.

"Do you want me to walk you to the door?" he offered.

Eyes wide as saucers, she answered, "no way, they'll murder you, I think you need to give it a bit longer," she also didn't want to scare him off any earlier than she had to.

He chuckled, "ok, then do you want me to call you when I get home, so I can make sure you got past the dragons?" honestly he knew he'd probably call her when he got home regardless of what she said.

Just as he predicted, she politely declined, "you don't have to do that, I'll be fine" she assured him.

"Ok then," he wouldn't bother arguing with her now, "remember to be fierce" he told her, pulling her into a quick hug that she didn't really respond to.

"I don't know if fierce is really what I am" she countered, "determined and stubborn and wilful sure, but I don't really think I can pull of fierce" she begun rambling, so he leaned down and placed his lips over hers.

Her eyes flew open in shock, not having expected him to make a move, personally she didn't think that her melt down mode was anything desirable, but she wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. When his lips moved against hers again, she sensed some hesitation, probably brought on by her lack of response, so even though she was freaking out internally she did as he said; _be fierce_. She placed a hand against his cheek as she leaned forwards into the kiss, and he took that as permission to invade her mouth, and she let him willingly. His hand slid over her thigh, pushing her skirt a little higher up her leg, and enjoying the feel of her skin, before he moved to grab her hip and slide her closer to him.

As she was moved closer to him, her other hand moved to meet her first, which was now situated on the base of his head, playing with the different lengths of hair, that she was quickly developing a fascination with. They stayed like that for a while, pressed together, their breathing rates quickening, and the little space between them lessening, until he'd pulled her so close one of her legs was hitched over his lap.

He hadn't meant to kiss her for that long, he'd originally only wanted it to be something quick and encouraging, enough to give her the bravery to go inside and face her father's fearlessly. He hadn't felt anything from her though, so he'd tried once more, hoping that he hadn't completely misread her. But she proved his suspicions right, latching onto him and kissing him back, and he'd remembered just how good this had felt the first time round. Only now he was actually interested in her for more than her body, and that made it so much more worthwhile.

As his hands ran over her and his lips increased their pressure on hers, all she could think was, _this is what happens when you have a plan, sexy boys kiss your brains out in their car!_

He was snapped out of their fervour when her porch light turned on, and he had a feeling the idling sound of his engine must have tipped her father's off to their whereabouts. She had noticed the same thing, so she pulled back, wiping the back of her hand across her lips, and giving him a big smile, before she turned and open the door to climb out. "Rach" he called one last time, and she turned with a look on her face that told him she already sort of knew what he was about to tell her. "You're totally fierce," and she beamed brighter, leaning over and placing one last peck on his lips before she slid out the car. As she neared the front door, it opened for her, her dad or daddy (he didn't know which was which) appeared in the doorway, and even with the man standing right next to her she turned and waved at him, smile still in place. So he waved back before he put the car in gear and took off, hoping that at least a remanent of that smile would still be there the next day, although he wouldn't know until he saw her.


	6. Chapter 6

**I just want to say, right off the bat, that I am pro-choice! I'm not against abortion, however, I personally feel that it is a big decision, and no one should ever be forced into it.**

**Lots of flashbacks and stuff in this chapter… hopefully it's not too confusing. Again apologies for any and all typos that got past me!**

It was Thursday night, and as Rachel lay awake in bed, she couldn't help but let her mind wander over just how much everything had changed in one week. It had been the Thursday previous when Noah had dropped her home, and her daddy had caught them mid-way through their first (again) make out session. In fact so much had happened in such a short span of time, she actually counted the days to make sure she hadn't mistaken two weeks for one.

Rachel had honestly been shocked that her father's hadn't gone mental at her when Noah had dropped her home that Thursday. Sure they hadn't been pleased, but when she'd walked in, they'd very calmly asked her how her day had been, and how dinner was. She'd had to admit that perhaps Noah had been right, and they had just needed a bit of alone time to wrap their head around what was happening.

They had even waited until the next morning to ask if Noah's mother knew about their situation, which was what they had started calling her pregnancy. She'd told them the truth, that the older woman didn't know, but she'd lied and told them that the reason for that was because she and Noah wanted his mother and her to be able to get to know each other first. So that when Deborah did find out it wouldn't be as awful a shock like it had been for Rachel's fathers. They'd warned her not to wait too long, but had left it alone because even if they were barely talking to her she still knew that they would have preferred to have heard the news straight from their daughter, and not an asshole OBGYN.

He'd picked her up for school, just like he'd promised, and he'd taken her to get a frozen coke just like he'd promised. Although he'd pulled over, a few blocks away from school with every intention of continuing what they'd started the night before. She was so giddy over his attention that she hadn't even noticed when he stopped the car, but when he leaned into her and placed a kiss on the side of her neck she realised pretty quickly. She squirmed as he kissed his way further up her neck, finally blocking his access by dropping her head to her shoulder when the tickling started to get too much for her.

He got the wrong idea though, and pulled away from her, "sorry" he mumbled quietly, "I thought…" he trailed off, turning his attention back to the road.

Her eyes widened as she realised what he was thinking, and she reached out a freezing cold hand to turn his face, "I'm ticklish" she told him quickly, "it just tickles when you do that is all" she said, grabbing a fistful of his shirt and pulling him back towards her. She only saw his smile for a split second before she closed her eyes and their lips collided.

The kiss was passionate but quick, and he pulled away with an uncomfortable expression, reaching his hand up to rub it over his lips, "your mouth is really cold" he explained.

She poked her tongue out in an odd fashion, as if testing it against the air, "it's a bit numb as well," she informed him when she was done testing. A mischievous smile spread across her face, "wait" she told him, sucking a big mouthful of the frozen drink into her mouth and swishing it around for a while, before finally swallowing it. Unbuckling her seatbelt she moved to her knees and leaned over him, running her freezing tongue over his warm lips, he shivered a little as she laughed, "that feels very bizarre" she told him, before she smiled and did it again.

That had been how Friday had started, and as she lay in bed she pondered the fact that it had been the turning point, until then she hadn't been sure how interested he was in her, but after their 20 minute frozen make out session, she'd been sure that her feelings were pretty much mutual.

She and Noah had sat with Quinn and Finn during lunch to sort out some of the other details of their situation. The general story they'd decided to go with was that she was going to have the baby (except they knew she wouldn't) and that she'd tell her dads they were going to give the baby up for adoption. Noah hadn't said anything at the time, because at the end of the day there wasn't going to be a baby, but he'd admitted to her on the phone that evening that if he'd really gotten a girl pregnant, he wouldn't want her to give the baby away. Or if they had to, he'd want to know that the baby would always understand why they'd given her up, and that they'd have kept her if it had been the better option.

As she stared at the ceiling of her dark room, she marvelled at the fact that it had been Noah and not her who had first started referring to their baby as a girl. She supposed it was because the real baby (Quinn's baby) was a girl, but she also had a niggling feeling that it was because he wanted a little girl more. He'd even started calling it 'blueberry,' "because it's a small kind of berry, duh" he'd explained to her when she'd asked why he'd chosen the blueberry over all other berries. She subconsciously ran her hand down to rest over her flat belly, realising how quickly that had become a habit of hers, she worried if it was a good thing or a bad thing. In one way it was good, it gave her fathers the exact impression she wanted to give them, but on the other hand, she was becoming more self conscious of what Noah would think of her if she started getting too invested in their fake baby. On top of that, she really didn't want anyone at school to notice her rubbing a non-existent baby bump, because they had already started to notice other things.

While Quinn had seemed quite pleased (and relieved) to see Rachel and Puck getting along so well, other people's reactions to their new found again attraction to each other was not as positive. Plenty of the jock crowd had started teasing him for slumming it, and making a lot of lewd comments about what kind of berry she tasted like.

She on the other hand had suddenly been deemed worth talking to by her original co-glee clubbers who all wanted to know if they were back together and whether they were doing it. They'd all cornered her after school on Friday to ask about the couples sexual endeavours, "because he was all over you at lunch, and there's no other reason he'd put up with you," Mercedes had pointed out. Rachel had used a few choice phrases she'd learnt from Noah to tell Mercedes to leave her alone. Rachel didn't want to push people away, because is not like she had many friends, but she had learnt that the other glee clubbers were a lost cause, as they tended to only like her when they wanted something from her, and were quite content to berate and tease her the rest of the time, along with most of the school. Puck had witnessed the exchange in the hallway though, and when an irritated Rachel had stormed away from a group of huffy gleeks he'd followed her out into the now empty quad.

"Hey" he called as he walked over to her, and when she looked up and seen him there he noticed her facial expression soften a bit but her brow was still somewhat creased. He took her hand and pulled her over to a bench, "what the hell was that all about?" he asked, already a bit pissed even if he didn't have a clue why.

"Nothing" she let out a deep sigh, her face still contorted into a pout, and it was his turn to sigh.

"I hate that, chicks always say that, it's obviously not nothing, I know this is a really radical and out of the box idea" he was being sarcastic now, and it only made her scowl more, "but if you tell me what's wrong, I may actually be able to help you sort it out" he pointed out.

She didn't answer for a moment, but when she couldn't come up with a better argument she admitted, "It's embarrassing."

He gave her a disbelieving look, "you know, half the stuff you do is embarrassing, and you think it's not, so there is some potential that this situation is just the opposite of that."

Her head flicked around to look at his, "what do I do that's embarrassing?" she asked, now even more concerned.

He made a sound of exhaustion, rubbing his hand down his face before turning to her, "I don't know, it's just that heaps of the crazy shit you say is uber weird, I'd be mortified if I caught myself talking like that" he admitted, only realising how harsh it sounded after he'd said it. He decided he'd try and dig himself out a bit, before her face fell any further, "you're not always like that, I mean, you always have a touch of the Rachel-crazy, but a lot of the stuff you say isn't embarrassing at all, just kind of weird and nutty" he told her, but her facial expression told him he'd only dug deeper.

Now totally convinced that she really was as annoying as they all told her she was she spoke up, "they asked me why you put up with me" she admitted quietly.

His face practically ignited with anger, and he stood up in front of her out of frustration, "who asked you that? Was it Kurt? Cos he's technically a dude so I can hit him, or was it wheel boy? Cos I'll jam some of his spokes so he can't roll straight, I can't hurt Mercedes if it was her, but I could make her cry, which I might do anyway, because she's as self absorbed as they all think you are, and she's not even half as talented as you." When he looked down at her and saw her smiling he stopped ranting, confused he asked, "why do you look happy now?"

She didn't condone violence or bullying, god knows she'd been on the receiving end of both enough times to think that both were a vile way to treat someone, but the fact that he was so mad, and so willing to run to her rescue had made her happy. _He cares_ was all she could think.

"Do I annoy you as much as I annoy everyone else?" she asked.

He was distracted from his anger by her question, and he moved to sit back down beside her, "at school and at glee you're sorta intense, and that can be," he searched for a way to be gentler about her nature then he had been before, "a bit irritating." He tried not to give her a chance to get upset about his comment, instead quickly adding, "but when it's just you, me and blue, you're not so full on, it's nice, it's interesting" he admitted.

She smiled brightly while she let her eyes sweep the quad quickly for other people in case they had been joined by others since they had first arrived, seeing no one around she leaned forwards and brushed her lips over his gently, muttering a quiet "thank you" as she pulled back slowly. She didn't get far though, because he leaned into her her, wrapping an arm around her back and pulling her nearer, he pulled her into a hug and planted a kiss on the top of her head.

"You shouldn't listen to them, it's not like they're all gems of social normalcy," he stated.

"I don't think that made sense" she told him, her voice muffled because her head was buried in his chest.

"It made plenty of sense" he countered, even though it didn't really, he knew she knew what he meant, "there is a reason they're all losers too, its cos they're all weird, they just banded together so now they have this weird little clique," listening to himself having a deep and meaningful with a girl he'd hated a week ago he kinda wanted to shoot himself. How had he let himself get so sucked in by all this crap, and this weird girl, he'd though as he sat there, with her body nuzzled up against his, he knew that originally he'd just been sucked in by the fact that the lying and the deception, was something that might make his rather boring existence in this shitty cow town a little less boring.

When she'd called him that night, he'd rushed to her, and the feeling of being noble and chivalrous and all that crap had actually made him feel sorta awesome. Then they'd spent the day together and he'd realised that she was actually pretty enjoyable when she was chilled out, and she could be kinda funny. After that, he'd made out with her again, and he'd enjoyed it more than a usual mack, just because it was her, and it had been waaaay hotter than the first time.

When he'd picked her up in the morning, he'd actually been excited to see her, and their pit stop had been pretty exciting. So he was now pretty sure he was falling for the girl who was having his baby, so to speak.

He pulled back from her, "you want me to drive you home?" he asked.

"No" she shook her head, "I'd like to walk, it's a nice afternoon" she told him, and he nodded, getting up to follow her back into the school hallway so that she could get the things from her locker that she'd been distracted from getting earlier.

"You know, you should probably do a bit less exercise, and eat some junk food" he told her as he leaned against the locker next to hers, "you're gonna have to put on some weight."

She spun around to look at him, horrified, "why do I need to put on weight?" she seemed disgusted by the idea of doing anything of the sort to her well maintained body.

He leaned closer to her, "because you're pregnant" he whispered, with a 'duh' expression on his face.

"Oh, that" she relaxed a bit, calmed by the fact that he wasn't just insulting her general appearance, "I don't think I'll need to, I mean, by the time regional's comes around and you know, everything happens, I won't be supposed to have a very noticeable baby bump" she whispered back.

"Sure" he agreed, taking her bag from her hand as wrapped an arm around her waist, walking with her to the front exit of the school, "but, your dads think you're what, six or seven weeks now, and regional's isn't for two months, do you really think that they won't notice when you're almost four months pregnant and you still haven't gained any weight?"He asked her sensibly.

She huffed, "fine, maybe I'll stop using my elliptical machine in the mornings" she offered, and he nodded satisfied by her answer.

"Yeah, and you never know, you might find the extra weight deposits its self somewhere nice" he said as he let his hand drift up her waist and curl around so he could run his thumb along the underside of her boob.

She gave his hand a gentle slap, pushing it back down before commenting, "but then my bras won't fit" she pointed out, as if the practicality outweighed the joy of a slightly less flat chest.

He leaned down, and to anyone else it would have looked as if her were placing a kiss in her hair as they walked along, but in actual fact he whispered something to her quietly, "you aren't wearing a bra" he pointed out, his famous smirk almost splitting his face in two.

"Oh, well in that case I guess it doesn't matter does it?" she retaliated with a smirk of her own, turning to stand in front of him as they reached the doors.

"See, now that is why I like you, your full of flirty surprises" he teased back, hands coming to rest on her hips as he walked her backwards towards the open door.

She smiled her 1000 watt smile at him, "so you like me?" and she was right back in innocent, sweet Rachel mode.

He rolled his eyes, "more then I should" he admitted, "I mean, look at me, I'm a stud" he held his arms out, as if for her to admire him.

"oh, so I guess if you're so much better than me, you won't be wanting a kiss good bye, what with all these people around?" her tone was teasing, but he knew that underneath the sentiment was real. She didn't know where they stood, hell, he didn't know where they stood, but she had the added anxiety of being the schools biggest gleek, he supposed that considering the way he'd treated her for the past year and a half she had every right to think he'd be embarrassed to be seen with her.

Well he wasn't, admittedly he was a little fearful of the unavoidable backlash, but he wasn't going to make her feel like shit to avoid a little hazing from the team. He held up her bag in his hand, "if you don't kiss me good bye, I'm not giving this back to you," he faux threatened.

She gave a huffy, "fine" but internally she was having a squee melt down, she took a step towards him, letting his hands settle back where they had been on her hips, before stretching up on her tippy toes to plant a kiss on his lips. He held her there for a moment, and when she felt him smiling against her lips she dropped back down, purely just to see him smile, and be proud that she had been what caused that reaction.

"You sure you don't want me to drop you home?" he asked once more, but she shook her head, "will I see you tomorrow?" he asked, trying not to sound like one of the desperate clingy chicks he so often brushed off.

She looked down at her feet, "I think I need to sit down with my father's tomorrow and have a proper talk about everything," she told him, looking up at his face again she smiled, "but I'll see you on Sunday for glee rehearsals" she told him, "you can pick me up for that if you want" she offered.

"Sure," he agreed, handing her her bag and leaning down to plant one last kiss on her cheek, "I'll pick you up for glee." And then she was gone, out the door and into the sunlight, turning to smile and wave back at him. He felt like crap the moment she was out of sight, he now had to get through almost 48 hours without her, as sappy as that sounded.

During that time he knew she was going to have to deal with her fathers, and he knew it would be hard for her, and he hated that she was going to have to do it alone. That's when he decided he was done. He was done fighting against his feelings, he wasn't going to worry anymore what people thought of them, he liked Rachel, and he knew that, so from now on, he was in this for good. Of course he wasn't going to tell her that, because that was supremely chick lame, he wondered as he walked back to his own locker to get his stuff, if this is what girls always meant when they complained that guy's feelings weren't accessible, because if it was that was just stupid, if guy's were as emotional as chicks then girls would whinge that it was just like dating another girl.

That was Friday, he spent his evening doing regular stuff, playing guitar, playing wii, teasing his sister, and avoiding his mother who wanted to know if he and Rachel had defined their relationship yet. When she finally cornered him, he'd begrudgingly admitted that he was pretty sure she was his girlfriend, and then to avoid the tirade of never ending questions he'd told his mom he felt sick, and gone to bed at 10:30.

On Saturday he worked, he had four pools to clean and two outdoor hot tubs and it had kept him busy all day. Contrary to what he told most of his team mates, the majority of his clients weren't cougars who he banged, he maybe came across a willing and worthy participant one out of every three or four weeks. Thankfully, none of his jobs had offered him anything other than work, although one of the pools he'd cleaned had been filled with three hyperactive carrot headed kids. While he'd tried to work around them, he'd made a silent pact with himself that if and when he ever had kids, he'd never let them behave like these terrors. He didn't hear anything form Rachel all day, so when he was heading up to bed, exhausted, he sent her a 'goodnight' message, which he knew was kinda wimpy, but what the hell.

"Hey, headin 2 bed, did u tlk 2 ur dads 2day? Hope it wasn't 2 bad," he pulled his shirt off, followed by his jeans, dumping them both in his washing basket, before finding a clean pair of pyjama pants. After going to bed early the night before he'd had a bit too much time on his hands to lay around thinking about Rachel, and then he'd kinda ended up with something else on his hands, and so tonight he needed new pants.

Just as he pulled them on, he heard his phone beep, tying his pants as he crossed the room he picked up the phone to check the message, "yeah I did, wasn't great, I'll tell u bout it tomorrow, ur still picking me up 1 rite?"

He typed back a quick reply, "ok, goodnite, I'll c u n blu 2morrow at 1," sending it off he climbed into bed, he was sure that if her day had been really bad she'd have called him, but it still worried him that he couldn't just know now.

As he rolled over and shut his bed side lamp off he got another message, "goodnight" He tried to sleep, reasoning that he'd see her tomorrow, and she'd be ok til then.

She wasn't.

When he pulled up at her house she came sprinting out, climbing into the truck, she didn't even look at him when she spoke, "drive somewhere."

It was an order, so he obeyed, he went the opposite direction to school, because he had a feeling that with the degree of panic on her face she had no intention to spend the afternoon singing. He pulled up on the outskirts of town, the scenic spot was a fairly popular make out place at night, but in the middle of the day there wasn't another car in sight.

He turned to face her, waiting for her to tell him what had gotten her so upset, and after what felt like a million years she took a deep breath, and turned to look at him. "They want me to have an abortion" she told him distantly.

"They want what?" he yelled, outraged that her father's would even tell her something like that, it would be different if it was what she wanted, but it wasn't. They had a plan, or rather, they had two, one real and one fake, but abortion had nothing to do with either.

"They think I won't be able to give the baby up, or I'll be too traumatised by the whole experience and it'll ruin my life or something," she leaned her head back on the headrest and closed her eyes. "They asked me to call my mother and ask her what she thought" she explained.

"Did you?" he asked, having not made the connection up until this point that without adoption Rachel wouldn't be the daughter of two men. Sure she was the biological daughter of one of her fathers, but her biological mother must have had to relinquish her legal rights to Rachel as a baby.

"No, because they're being hypocritical, if she hadn't been an egg donor and a surrogate, they never would have had a child, that's what I'd be doing with adoption, giving a child to someone who can't otherwise have kids" she huffed.

"And they accepted that?" he probed further.

"Well they didn't give up easily, they made all these points that my mother was a lot older when she went through all this, at the end of it all I just put my foot down and said no," she turned to look at him gauging his reaction, but his expression was hard to read. "At the end of the day it's a moot point anyway, I can't have an abortion if there's nothing there to abort can I?" she pointed out to him.

She saw his attention snap back to her, "they don't know that" he pointed out.

"Who cares?" she was mad, and pissy, and he could tell that under the surface there were other thoughts running through her mind, but she didn't know how to get it out.

He reached out and pulled her over to him, wrapping her in a hug that she seemed to dissolve into, "I wish you would have called me or something" he told her.

She shook her head against his chest, "it wasn't that horrible," she admitted, although he found it hard to believe, "I mean, it's not as if they were forceful, it wasn't another yelling match or anything, they were just very persistent that I really think it through." She pulled away from him and brought her hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose, she'd had a permanent headache since she'd sat down with her fathers the previous afternoon. "The part that I'm worried about is that they aren't going to move on until it's not a possibility anymore, that's five weeks, a whole month that I'm going to have to listen to; 'sweetheart we don't want to see you get your heart broken when you have to give this baby away' when really, the thing they're most concerned about is the chance that I'll get too attached and keep it" she bitched albeit quite eloquently at him.

"I wish this were easier for you" he admitted, feeling helpless that he couldn't find a solution for her. "You're welcome to spend more time at my place, my Mom is already obsessed with you" he smiled, "and Abbey just thinks your cool incarnate."

She chuckled at him, before deciding that she was done talking about it and feeling miserable, "can we get out of the car?" she asked him, "I feel like I've been trapped in my house all weekend, I want to walk around a bit" she pleaded, sweetly. So he agreed and climbed out of the car with her, they wandered off on one of the hiking trails for a while, arms linked, and he wondered how he had never noticed the view from the area in the past.

When she'd gotten home that night, her dads had asked her when they were going to get to meet the mystery boy, "Noah, no last name," who had gotten her pregnant.

She had told them (rather rudely) that when they stopped harassing her about aborting her baby, and about her bad life choices, then she would consider letting her meet him. Had she realised at the time the actions that her refusal would start, she probably would have just marched outside, grabbed Noah before he had a chance to leave and taken him in to meet her fathers. But as the saying goes, 'hindsight is always 20/20', and because of her one negative response not only had her life gone even more haywire, but his had too. She turned her head in the dark to peek over at the boy next to her, he was fast asleep, he looked so very calm that she almost wished he wouldn't wake up, that they could just stay this way forever, but that wasn't going to happen, the real world was out there, and in the morning she was going to have to face it.

**Ok, so this chapter got kinda long, and I was only half way through, so consider this part one, and part two will be about the rest of their very hectic week, and you'll find out what exactly her fathers have gone and done that has made everything harder!**

**Please please please review, and let me know what you think and how you feel about the chapter!!... I live for reviews!!**


	7. Chapter 7

**So uhh… I suck at not embellishing… so this chapter goes on FOREVER! And I'm still not up to the 'Thursday night sleep over'! So the two parter has become a three parter!! So here is Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, at least a lot happens plot wise in this chapter!**

**Also reminder to everyone that this story takes place after 'wheels' and after that is AU, so that's why there is no mention of Rachel's crush on Mr. Shue. I realise of course that I've been referring to the upcoming 'regionals' and not 'sectionals,' that is because I really need them to be out of town for more than a day when Rachel has the 'miscarriage', (and also because I wrote the first chapter on a whim and didn't plan out the overall plot very well). So for the stories sake, can we just assume that sectionals went down very much as they did in the show, but without the baby mama drama!**

Monday had been when it all began, Noah had picked Rachel up on his way to school, stopped at a gas station for her frozen coke, and from then on their day had been almost normal.

Rachel and Quinn had sat together on the bleachers during their midmorning break enjoying the sunshine and stumbling through the awkwardness of being not quite friends. Between the pregnancy Quinn was still hiding at home, and the pregnancy Rachel was faking at home, the two girls had plenty to sit and commiserate about.

"I feel a bit sorry for him that he spends so much time sitting with me while I have melt downs" Rachel admitted about Noah, "I'm not actually having his baby, he shouldn't really have to be there for me all the time" she sighed.

"Yeah but you guys are dating now right? I mean if he's your boyfriend then he should be there, that's one of the main reasons to have a boyfriend," Quinn countered.

"See that's the problem though, we haven't dated, the closest thing we had to a date was dinner with his mom," Quinn cringed, "but I feel like maybe he is my boyfriend, but I can't tell, I'm not very good at reading people," it was a captain obvious kind of thing to say, but Rachel had a tendency to be that way.

"Well I am good at reading people, and he is totally into you," The blonde affirmed, "he practically hangs off you, and he like smiles, when you smile, and all that kind of lame crap" she affirmed.

"Oh" Rachel said in surprise, a smile spreading across her face, "really?"

"Yeah, I can't believe you don't find it kinda annoying" Quinn added, "I mean Finns not that clingy and sometimes even he gets on my nerves, although, the pregnancy hormones probably add to that, let me just say, that no matter how bad everything else gets, at least you don't have the killer mood swings" she moped.

Rachel sighed, "I don't know, I've been getting pretty emotional, at least you have an excuse!"

The ex-cheerleader smiled at the other girl, "that's true, I never really thought of it that way," and Rachel nodded as if to agree with each other. When the bell rang the girls started to slowly wander back to the school buildings. "This is nice" Quinn commented, her honest kindness shocking Rachel a bit. "I haven't really had any girls to talk to since everyone found out, I mean, I used to tell Brittany and San everything, and now they just ignore me."

Rachel still seemed quite shocked, "you used to tell them everything? Like talk about your feelings and your problems?" the shorter of the two asked in pure amazement.

Quinn laughed a little, "Well with the exception of the baby, yeah, why?"

"It just seems odd" Rachel commented, "I never tell anyone what I'm thinking about."

Quinn's brow furrowed, "why not?" she asked.

"No one wants to hear what I'm thinking" Rachel replied in a nonchalant manner as if it were obvious, and Quinn had the smallest realisation that it was a possible that the shorter girl's odd behaviour was not only the cause of her isolation but also the result, a vicious cycle.

The two girls went their separate ways, heading to different classes, they didn't see each other until Glee rehearsals that afternoon, by which point Rachel had already begun to notice some odd goings on around the school.

Rachel had had to pick up an extra textbook that had been on order from the school office, upon walking into the room, both of the ladies behind the desk had stopped talking suddenly. The way they greeted her so over enthusiastically had been her first clue, usually the two uncommitted women would barely look up from their magazines to serve students. Having given her the book she'd come for, they eagerly watched her wander out the office, and when she turned to look back at them through the window in the door, she could see them talking animatedly.

Had it been just that she'd have dismissed it, but it wasn't, one of the janitors had insisted he carry her books while she walked across a section of hallway that had been freshly mopped and she could have sworn that other teachers had been staring at her more than usual. She went to the bathrooms to check that she didn't have food on her face or some note stuck to her back on her way to her final class, but having found nothing she rushed off, she was still late though, walking in after everyone else was seated. She tried to apologise to the teacher for being late, but the woman simply shushed her sweetly, telling her that it was fine. When the elderly lady walked past her later whilst handing out task sheets she bent in close to Rachel and whispered, "you're ok aren't you dear," a confused Rachel informed her that she was fine, to which she received the response, "good, well you just make sure that you stay that way ok?"

By the time Rachel got to glee she was getting very paranoid, sitting down next to Quinn she asked the girl, "do I look sick or something? Or do I have something on me" she stood up and spun around so Quinn could look.

"No, you look fine" she answered hesitantly, not sure what was going on.

Rachel huffed resignedly, "people have been treating me really weirdly," she informed her quasi-friend.

"You look a little tired," the blonde admitted, "which wouldn't be so obvious if you had a better concealer," she added, because even when Quinn didn't mean to be rude sometimes her cheerio nature got the better of her. "Oh, or maybe people have noticed that we're hanging out, and now they're starting to think you're cool, people used to stare at me all the time, well I mean, they still do, but now it's because I'm pregnant" she tried to reason.

Rachel shook her head, "no it's not like that, its teachers more than students," she admitted.

It was at that moment that Mr. Shue walked in, brandishing a stack of papers, as he handed them out he informed them that this was a song he wanted them to try and have ready for Regional's, when he reached Rachel and Quinn he looked down at the two of them and smiled, "how are you girls going? You both ok?" he turned to Quinn to say, "If you're not feeling up to anything just stay sitting down ok" but he gave Rachel a pointed stare also, as if to say 'you too.'

"See, that's what I'm talking about" Rachel whispered to Quinn as the man wandered back to the front of the room, "what is that all about?"

Quinn shrugged, equally perplexed by their teacher's odd behaviour, "I don't know, but I'm going to bring you some concealer tomorrow ok?"

If only they had know what had been going on behind their backs.

_Earlier in the day, Emma had been sitting in her office picking lint from her cardigan when her phone rang, "Hello, This is Emma Pillsbury, guidance counsellor" she chirped into the phone._

"_Hi, look I was put through to you from the front office, my name is John Berry, my daughter Rachel is a sophomore, her home room number is…" she cut him off._

"_I know who your daughter is Mr. Berry," she informed him politely, "I've helped out with various glee club events occasionally, your daughter certainly make an impression."_

"_Right," he hesitated, as if unsure of how to go on, "look, uhh, Rachel has gotten herself into a bit of a situation, and uh," now that he had this woman on the phone he wasn't sure what he was looking for anymore. He supposed what he really wanted to know was wether Rachel had gone to the woman for help. He knew that she hadn't really gotten any at home, and he felt guilty (to a degree) for that, so part of him was just desperately hoping that his daughter had found a grown up to help her deal with her problems. He was aware that Rachel had some boy lurking around who seemed to be some source of comfort, but he was less then pleased about that fact. This boy had gotten his baby girl pregnant, and that brought him to another thing he wanted to know, who the hell this kid was. He knew nothing about this boy, except that his first name was Noah and he drove a beat up utility truck, he wanted to find this kid and scare the crap out of him, or at least work out whether he should be keeping his daughter far away from the boy. _

"_Mr. Berry?" Emma enquired into the phone, "is there something you would like to ask me about your daughter?" she questioned, hoping to make whatever he was worrying about easier for him._

"_Yeah I guess, look, I was wondering if she may have been in to see you?" he asked slowly._

"_I'm sorry no," she replied, "we do talk every now and then, but I don't think she has been to see me about a personal issue in a few months," Emma thought back to the day she had forced Rachel to sit and discuss eating disorders several months prior._

"_Right" he sounded disappointed; "that discussion wasn't about a boy was it?" he probed tentatively._

"_Um no, not particularly" she admitted uncommittedly, she wasn't really supposed to divulge the conversations she had with students to outside people unless she really believed that a child was at risk. "Is there a particular issue you would like to discuss with me?" she asked the very concerned father, "I could ask Rachel to come and talk to me about it if you're having trouble getting through to her at home?" she offered._

"_I don't know" he didn't sound convinced, "we'd like to be able to deal with it ourselves" he admitted, "you wouldn't be able to tell me anything about her social life at school would you?" he asked._

"_Ah, what in particular did you want to know?" she replied cautiously._

"_I was wondering if you knew who her boyfriend is?" he asked, "all we know is that his name is Noah?" he may as well be honest with the woman._

"_Her boyfriend Noah?" she questioned, slightly shocked, it was not her place to tell these men who their daughter was dating, there were plenty of occasions where she wished it was within her power to tell parents of their children's 'at school' behaviour, but it wasn't. Besides, as much as she was quite sure the only 'Noah' Rachel could possibly be dating was Puck, there were technically other Noah's in the school, and it wouldn't be fair to dob in (so to speak) one boy on a hunch. "I'm afraid there are a few boys by the name of Noah at the school, and I honestly don't know if she's dating any of them." She could hear the man sigh dejectedly on the other end of the line, feeling like she knew where this was going she decided to press on, "are you concerned that the relationship may be getting too serious for her? Or perhaps you're worried she may be becoming sexually active?" _

"_We already know that she's having sex" he admitted._

"_Oh, well I could…" she fully intended to offer to talk to Rachel about the responsibilities of sex, but she was cut off._

"_My daughters pregnant" he told her desperately, "so it's quite a serious situation" he pointed out._

"_No of course," Emma was in total shock, all she could think was, 'how do these girls keep getting themselves into this situation.' _

"_So are you sure that you don't know who she's been seeing, because it's very important that we sit them down and have a proper discussion about the whole situation," he stressed._

_Emma took a deep breath readying herself before she spoke, "I'll tell you what, if any faculty member is going to know who she has been dating it will probably be Mr. Shuester, he's the glee coordinator, and he sees your daughter quite a few times a week," she decided it was probably better not to point out that he also spent a lot of time with the most likely candidate for Rachel's boyfriend. "I happen to know he's taking a class at the moment, but I can take your contact details if you would like and have him give you a call as soon as he can" she offered, following it up with, "I can't be sure that he'll know, but he'd be your best chance." Rachel's dad thanked her and gave her his phone number, whist taking his details one nauseating thought crossed her mind, "just out of curiosity, you didn't by any chance tell the woman whom you spoke to in the office about Rachel's situation did you?"_

"_Uhh, yes I suppose I did," he admitted, "should I not have?" he asked._

"_I'm sure it won't matter," the Emma assured him, but internally she began to panic, realising that if he had told the two gossip hounds who manned the office, then half the staff probably knew already, this was not going to be good. "I'll get Mr. Shuester to call you back" she promised before getting off the line, and heading out of the room._

_As Emma walked through the empty school halls she wondered how exactly Will would handle all of this, of course she would offer him some advice, but really at the end of the day Rachel and Noah were both a lot closer to him then her, and this was going to be hard for him to watch. She'd watched as he'd grown attached to all of his glee kids, becoming a father figure to most of them, as well as a trusted teacher. She knew he'd been devastated when he found out about Finn and Quinn, he could see the stress a coming baby was putting them under, and it crushed him he couldn't do more to help them. She couldn't imagine how he'd feel once he found out about Rachel, he'd always been very protective of her, even if she drove him crazy half the time, and while she knew he wasn't that close to Puck, it was still going to hurt him that he hadn't been able to guide the boy better. With these thoughts circling around her head she didn't hear the bell ring, but when kids started pouring out of the classrooms she moved quickly towards the Spanish room, wanting to catch him before he left._

"_Hi," she said tentatively as she stuck her head in the door and surveyed the room for any lingering students._

_She waited as the last couple of kids filed out of the room, before locking the door behind her, which earned her a curious look from her co-worker. "I have something I need to talk to you about, it's a bit sensitive" she informed him, and he nodded, leaning against his desk he motioned for her to do the same. She opted to perch herself on a student desk in front of him, "Rachel Berry's father called me this morning" she told him, seriousness etched into her features, "he told me that she's pregnant." She watched as a wave of shock washed over his features, followed by one of dismay, he rubbed a hand down his face, muttering something under his breath, before looking directly at her, she could see in his expression that he shared her felling of failure and missed chances, "they want to know who the father is" she explained._

_He sighed, "my guess would be Puck" he told her, "they've been dating for a while," clearly he, like many others hadn't quite realised when they'd broken up. "I thought it was quite casual, but I've noticed them getting closer just recently, and they both skipped rehearsals on Sunday," he looked at her as if for approval. _

"_They said his name was Noah but they didn't know his last name" she told him, proving him right. "I wasn't totally sure if it was Puck, so I didn't want to confirm anything" she added, "I told him you knew her the best of all the staff and I'd get you to call him back so the two of you could discuss it." _

_He nodded in agreement, taking the paper that she offered to him, "I'll uh, give him a call, see if I can help them out a bit." He stood to move out of the room, picking up a folder of teaching directions he turned towards the door, before suddenly turning back, "of all the kids, I would never have imagined Rachel in this situation" he admitted sadly, "I always thought she'd be more that this" he gestured at the room around them, though she knew he meant the town and the prospect of never leaving._

_He poked his Head into her office about half an hour later, "I called him" he told her, pulling her attention away from her perfectly manicured desk plant._

"_How'd it go?" she asked warily._

_He tilted his head to the side in consideration, "about as well as it could, considering," he informed her, "I told him I'd noticed her dating a boy from glee, and that his name was Noah, I didn't tell him Pucks surname though of course, that would be inappropriate, but I promised to keep an eye on her, make sure she seemed ok, physically and emotionally." She nodded along with him, agreeing that what he'd told the Berry's was a suitable answer, "it gave him some more insight I guess and some reassurance, I get the feeling things aren't being very well handled at home, it's probably good for us to watch her a bit."_

_He smiled at her, showing her he was glad he could be helpful, but she returned a wary look, "I don't think we'll be the only ones watching her" she told him, "he told the ladies in the front office," and she watched as realisation dawned on her face. "Sadly I get the feeling this isn't going to stay a secret too long," she admitted dejectedly._

_He gripped his face as he thought it through, "I guess we do what we can to keep it low key, remind the staff not to spread rumours, and offer support when it comes out."_

Glee practice was almost over, and Mr. Shue had gotten decidedly weirder as rehearsal went on, insisting that everyone stay super hydrated, and take rest breaks every 15 minutes, and constantly reminding people that if they weren't feeling up to it they could sit down, which had meant Kurt sat down during any song he didn't have solo lines in, pulling out his iPhone when he was bored.

Whist the recommendations were given to all the glee members, Mr. Shue had given pointed stares to Quinn and Rachel every time and now Quinn was as suspicions as Rachel had been.

"Maybe he knows" Quinn whispered during their final rest break.

"Knows what?" Rachel asked in confusion.

Quinn stared at Rachel's stomach, "you know, maybe he _knows_!"

Rachel suddenly looked very alarmed, "how could he possibly know? It's not like anyone told him, unless Finn told him," she glanced around, shooting a filthy look at Finn who was sitting with Noah and the other guys on the opposite side of the room, "he told Mr. Shue about you being pregnant," she pointed out.

"He didn't tell Mr. Shue," Quinn informed her, sending a calming smile at the now very confused teen boy.

"How do you know?" Rachel panicked, "he doesn't always have the best judgement."

Quinn rolled her eyes, "because I specifically told him not to" she admitted.

"Oh," Rachel sighed, placated, "well in that case Mr. Shue couldn't know," she said confidently, before fear clouded her eyes, "could he?"

The blonde shrugged unsure, "I don't know, I mean it's not like we haven't talked about it at school, maybe someone overheard us?"

"I hope not, I thought we were fairly careful" the smaller of the two girls panicked, "I'll ask him after glee" she said decidedly.

Quinn gave Rachel a moronic stare, "ask him what? 'Mr. Shue, did you know I'm _pregnant_?'" she whispered the last word very quietly.

Now it was Rachel's turn to roll her eyes, "no, I'll ask him if there was anything he's concerned about in terms of my performance in glee" she said as if It were obvious.

"Oh, yeah that's a good idea" Quinn admitted, as they stood up to do one last number with the final five minutes of rehearsal.

At the end of the practice Quinn corralled Noah out of the room so Rachel could have a moment to talk to Mr. Shuester alone, "Mr. Shue?" he looked up from the stack of papers he was organising on the piano top, "I was wondering, umm, you seemed, uhh," she scratched her head, trying to refocus. "Am I doing something in rehearsals that you're displeased with?" she asked, "you seemed a bit hesitant to include me today" she explained.

He looked a little shocked, he'd thought he'd been quite subtle, but apparently not, he took a deep breath, letting it out in a sigh, "look Rachel, your dad called the school today," he watched as a look of horror spread across her face, "he explained your situation." He gestured at her stomach, and her hands quickly flew up to cover the area, when he saw her getting angry he jumped in, trying to defend her father, "he seemed quite worried that you're too stressed," the reasoned.

"Yeah? Well maybe they should try to stress me out a bit less" she almost yelled, "I can't believe they called you and just started doling out my personal issues, who else knows?" she asked, and he could see tears creeping into her eyes.

"Miss Pillsbury knows," he admitted, "and a couple of other faculty members" he sugar coated the situation, not wanting to upset her anymore then needed.

"A couple of other faculty members? Is that why people have been treating me strangely all day? Because that is more than a couple!" She asked loudly.

"Look Rachel, I don't know how many of the staff know, but what I do know is that they will be respectful of your situation," that comment earned him a snort, and internally he had to admit she was right, some of the teachers at McKinley were worse gossips than the students. He ignored her protests and carried on, "and on top of that, I know that your fathers wouldn't have turned to the school for no reason, I spoke to your dad and he was very worried about how you're coping," he paused. "Rachel, they don't even know who the father is," he pointed out.

"Well maybe if they had a reasonable conversation about this with me it wouldn't have come to this, all they ever do is yell at me or lecture me or ignore me," she said accusingly before dropping her head to look at the ground. "Noah's been amazing about all of this, really supportive" she assured him, "but he doesn't make the best first impression," she admitted reluctantly, looking up at him guiltily.

Will stepped forwards placing a supportive hand on her shoulder, "look, I know that Puck is" he stopped to think of a nice way to phrase it, "an acquired taste, but if he wants to do right by you then I'm sure your fathers will see that," he could see the tears in her eyes welling up. "I think that all they really want is a chance to meet him and get to know him" he assured her, and even though he had no real proof of this she seemed to believe him, a tear escaping her eye as she nodded in agreement with him. Watching one of his kids cry was horrible for him, with Rachel standing before him in the state that she was in all he could think of was the moment when a teary Finn had collapsed into his arms in the auditorium after learning of Quinn's pregnancy. At the time all he had been able to do to console the boy had been to hug him. So that what he did now, stepping forwards he pulled Rachel into a hug, and holding onto her tightly as he felt her little body sob against him.

When she was a little calmer, she spoke from where she stood, mushed into his chest, "I should go talk to Noah," she informed him, pulling back and scowling at his shirt, "I'm sorry, I think I got mascara on you," she pointed to some black smudges on his top before running her fingers under her eyes to neaten any moved makeup.

He shook his head, rubbing a hand over the spot she'd pointed to, "its fine, but I think Noah left already," he gestured to the empty room obviously.

She chuckled a little, "he'll be outside somewhere," she pointed to the door, "he doesn't like it when I walk home," she explained.

He nodded as if to agree it was a bad idea, and after both picking up all their belongings he followed her to the door. As they exited the choir room they found Puck standing on the opposite side of the hallway, he pushed himself off of the locker he was leaning on as they emerged, taking in the sight of his distressed girlfriend. "What happened?" he asked her, "what did you say?" he asked Mr. Shue accusingly as he stepped forwards wrapping her in a protective hug.

"He didn't do anything" she assured him, tapping him gently on the chest.

"Why have you been crying then?" he asked her, but his angry gaze never shifted from the choir teacher.

"Come on" she said, pulling herself out of his embrace and tugging on his shirt as if to get him to move, "I'll tell you what happened," she assured him, taking him by the hand and leading him down the hall away from their teacher, but not before he shot one more menacing glare at Mr. Shue, as if warning him to be ready.

"You sure you don't want me to come in now?" he questioned, peering past her at her house.

"I'm sure, I think they will probably need a bit more warning then just, 'oh hi, here's Noah'," she explained, "but tomorrow for dinner right?" she couldn't help but panic that he'd back out on her, its wasn't that she didn't have enough faith in him, it was more that she was convinced that if he was even half as nervous about meeting her dads as she was about it, he'd have run a long time ago.

"Of course babe," he said casually, leaning across the seat of his truck to kiss her goodbye, and she took his sense of calm as a good sign.

The next evening they found themselves lying on either side of her bed, staring blankly up at the ceiling, lost in thought. "That was," she started, not knowing the best way to explain the evening they had just had with her fathers.

"Long? Intense?" he tried.

"Yes" she agreed, "both of those things is what it was" and then frowned at the poorly constructed sentence she had just uttered. "They asked you a lot of questions" was the conclusion she came to.

"Yeah, I think they know me better then I know me" he nodded exhaustedly.

"At least it wasn't loud," she pointed out, still staring upwards, "I was expecting a lot more yelling!" she confessed, finally turning to look at him, "they were very restrained vocally, thank you for going along with it" she smiled at him when he also turned to look at her.

He rolled himself over, so he lying right next to her, nuzzling his head into her shoulder and draping his arm across her hips, careful to rest it low enough that should her father's walk in and see them, they wouldn't accuse him of squashing the baby, but high enough that they wouldn't think he was trying to do anything else. She placed her hand on the back of his head, playing with his hawk, and they stayed that way for a while.

Upon finding out that Noah would be coming to dinner the following night, her father's must have spent hours coming up with lists of questions to ask him. That was the only way she could possibly imagine that they could have come up with so many things to grill him about, asking him everything, from all the details about his home life, to his grades, to his co-curricular activities, to his affiliations with any gangs, (yeah, they'd really asked that). They'd asked whether he'd ever tried alcohol or drugs, if he'd had sex with other girls, if he'd been tested for STI's, or if he had a police record. By the time they'd gotten to the baby questions, they'd already finished dinner and desert, and had all been sitting on the couches in the living room when they started. Did he agree with Rachel's choice to carry the baby, did he agree with the choice to give it up for adoption, what was he planning to do to help with the pregnancy, did he want them to live together, and so it went on for hours, and when they had finally escaped to her room at almost 11, and they were both exhausted.

He'd answered most of the questions honestly or with a pre-planned answer that was in keeping with their overall story. There were a few personal questions he'd had the common sense to lie about, "I have a B+ average," (it was closer to B-), "I'm not really interested in drugs, my cousin tried pot once, he said it freaked him out, I don't like the idea of not being in control of my own thoughts," (he wasn't a druggie, but he'd certainly dabbled more then he wanted to let on.) When he'd told them he didn't have a police record, she'd thought he was lying, but had been shocked to find out later that apparently he was too badass to ever get caught. "Yes" he thought she should have the baby, "no" he didn't think they should give it up, but he had admitted, "that's what I want, not what's best for the baby, I know it's not realistic to think we could provide a kid all the things they need or should have." When it came to his contribution to the pregnancy, "I know she's on your health insurance, but that won't cover maternity clothes and all the extras, I've been saving all my pool cleaning money so I can help pay for those kinds of things." When it came to the question of them living together, instead of make something up, he'd admitted they hadn't talked about it, and he'd make sure to take it into consideration. She hoped he'd done well, but she knew she wouldn't really know until Noah went home and they could talk to her without him there.

He eventually yawned against her neck, "I should go before I fall asleep," he groaned as he pushed himself up off her and crawled off the bed.

"Yeah, sorry again, about this," she told him again, standing up and walking down the hallway with him.

"Rach, stop apologising, its fine" he said quietly, stopping at the end of the hallway before they came into view of the living room where her fathers were sitting and pulling her into a hug. "Besides, you can totally make it up to me another time" he whispered devilishly as he reached down and squeezed her ass. His actions earned him a squeak and a gentle slap in the chest, before she pushed him out into the next room.

"Noahs going home" she announced to the room, and both her father's looked up from their books to wave the boy off in a less than enthusiastic manner.

She walked him to the front door, with the intention of walking out to the car with him, but he blocked her path. "Don't come out here, it's cold and you don't have shoes on" he said, leaning down to kiss her on the cheek, "I'll see you tomorrow before school ok?" he reminded her, and then he was gone, pulling the door closed behind him so she couldn't follow.

"Well?" she asked as she walked back into the lounge room.

Her father's both looked up at her for a moment, and then at each other, as if having a silent debate about what to tell her. "When he walked in here, I almost cried, I mean honestly sweetheart, he looks like a thug" the smaller and generally kinder (though apparently not in this instance) of her two fathers 'John' commented.

"Buuuut," her dad, 'Chris' intervened before she had a chance to get upset, "he does seem to be reasonably sensible," he paused, "I mean, he did get you pregnant so let's not go handing out awards or anything" he told her when she smiled. "But it could have been a lot worse, at least he wants to be involved and help, he seems to be quite realistic about the whole situation, although god knows what'll happen if the two of you break up, he might just disappear." He mused a bit insensitively.

Trying to soften that particular blow her daddy piped back up again, "I think, and I know you don't want to hear this, but it might be a good Idea to slow things down, and just take it a step at a time til the baby is born, I just think you're taking on too much trying to juggle a relationship and a pregnancy," he said, trying not to offend her.

They weren't being particularly nice, but then again they weren't too upset. She could see on their faces that they were exhausted too, the evening had been draining for everyone, so she just nodded and agreed, "we uh, we have slowed down," she said, not being able to think of a better way to tell her father's that they weren't very serious. "I'm going to go to bed, I'll see you in the morning" she told them before kissing them both good night and turning to leave the room.

"Rach?" her Dad stopped her, "this doesn't mean he doesn't have to come around again, we want to know how things are going between the two of you, and we want to know when you make decisions about your future, and about the baby ok?" he reminded her.

"Ok dad," she agreed, She couldn't help but smile as she walked back to her room, it wasn't perfect, there was no way this situation could be, but she felt as if a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders that she didn't have to worry about anymore.

The following day two irate educators stood in the office of a man, who in his opinion was severely underpaid for the crap that he had to put up with.

"This is an outrage, how have you not put a stop to this atrocity of a situation yet?" Sue yelled, her face only inches from Figgins'. "He's not running a glee club he's running a fornication ring," she yelled, pointing at the curly headed man in question.

"Will is not the girls' keeper Sue, he can't be held responsible for the situation," not wanting to give Sue a chance to start yelling again he continued on. "That said, there is a problem here, two girls in the same grade, pregnant at the same time, it means our sex education lessons aren't getting through, we need something more drastic. Clearly we can't rely on our health educators to preach safe sex habits" he glared at Sue as he spoke, "so I have organised for a professional, to talk to the student body tomorrow, and all of the kids in glee are going to have a short one on one session with her after the assembly," he told the two fuming teachers decidedly.

Will stopped his pacing to glower at the man sitting behind the desk, "What? You just said that their involvement to glee had nothing to do with it," he yelled.

"Look, I'm sorry William, I don't like to think that you have been neglectful, but there are four kids that are about to become parents and they are all in the glee club, someone needs to look into this" he'd clearly made up his mind, but Will was having none of it.

"So I'll look into it, you don't need to bring someone else in to do it, I'll sit down and talk to all of them, they're more likely to talk to me about it anyway, and if you bring in another person then the student body is just going to get more suspicious and ask more questions. All the kids know about Quinn's pregnancy, but if you do this you'll be outing Rachel and Puck, and that's not up to us to do" he said, turning to glare at Sue every time she scoffed about his opinions.

"Look William, I've made up my mind about this, we won't announce names, we won't even give a reason for the assembly, let the students assume what they want, and as you said, all the kids already know about Ms. Fabray, so they'll probably just assume she is the only one, I'm sorry," he held his hand up to silence the angry man in front of him. "I do not want any more kids at this school ending up in the same situation, I apologise William, but we cannot afford for this to get any worse, the school board will have something to say about this as it is."

Will bit his lip in an attempt not to yell anymore, and in the calmest voice he could muster he told Figgins, "if this is your decision that's fine, but when this all blows up and you have two more kids being ridiculed, don't put the blame on anyone else." With that he turned and stormed out of the room, slamming the office door behind him. It took all his self restraint not to turn around and go back in when he heard Sue start yelling about how he should be fired because clearly he's the world's worst educator.

Gritting his teeth he rampaged down the school hallway, not noticing when he stormed past two gossipy cheerleaders, "I wonder what that's all about?" Santana quipped, clearly sensing a scandal.

"My guess, is that he's mad about something," Brittany offered in her typically unhelpful manner.

"Really?" the darker girl asked sarcastically, turning away when the blonde nodded earnestly. She wandered a little further down the hall, her counterpart at her side, and stopped when she stood out the front of the principal's office. "Bet it has something to do with that," she said pointing at their raging cheer coach going mental at the principle, "guess we'll find out soon enough, it's not like Ms. Sylvester ever leaves anything behind closed doors," and with that she wandered off happily to her next class, mulling though all the potential gossip.

**You can bet they will find out soon!... and you will get to find out why Noah spends Thursday night at Rachel's!**

**Ok, PLEASE REVIEW!... this took me FOREVER to write, I'm feeling quite uninspired by Rachel and Puck lately!! Please re-inspire me!! **


	8. Chapter 8

**Ok so you would have had a new chapter days ago, but had a pissy fit at me and wouldn't let me upload! So I am sorry for the delay, but it totally wasn't my fault!!!**

**Yeah, I made Matt in love with Mike, so sue me! And I tried to make the Finn Quinn pregnancy a little more believable.**

"Ok is this really happening?" Finn whispered at the three others sitting next to him in the auditorium isles. His equally horrified peers all nodded silently as they stared open mouthed at what they were witnessing in front of them.

"In this video you can see the baby is crowning, now for most women it may take several contractions for the baby's head to completely move through the birth canal, however, contrary to popular myth this portion of the birth is not always the most painful portion. In fact if we fast forward through the birthing of the head," many scared and nauseated students heaved a sigh of relief as the video sped up to skip past the shocking footage, but most turned away again when the video went back to real time. "In this moment you can see the doctors using forceps and twisting the baby, to try and move the shoulders past the pelvis, because the baby has become lodged."

"Clearly the idea here is to scare the female students into insisting on safe sex practices," Rachel reasoned, she was wide eyed and without a doubt as disturbed as all the other girls in the auditorium. Pointing at Noah she added, "And just to scare the males in general."

"Gee thanks for pointing that out," Puck snapped at her, "it's not like you're unaffected," he quipped, the stress of the whole situation making him snarky.

"I didn't say I wasn't," she bit back, "after this I have no intention of ever having sex in my entire life, unless it's with another girl," and even in the terrible situation, both boys showed they were still male by turning to look at her, eyebrows raised and interest peaked.

"Oh, stop," Quinn said, elbowing Finn in the ribs, "I can't believe you've done this to me," she said, terrified, "and you're huge, so you're baby will be huge" she whined, "I'm going to break my hoo haa trying to push your watermelon baby out," she cried frightened, before standing up and running out of the auditorium. Many of the other students watched her go, glad for any distraction from the current presentation.

Finn made a move to follow her, but Rachel stopped him, "I'll go," she told him, standing and making her way out in a slightly calmer fashion, many eyebrows raising as they watched her follow the blonde.

One outside she found Quinn standing under a tree, catching her breath as she tried to calm herself down, "this isn't good," she told Rachel as the smaller girl approached her, "this is obvious, really obvious," she stated morosely.

Rachel knew what she meant, the school and been buzzing with the news of Quinn's pregnancy for a few weeks now and nothing like this had happened, people were going to realise that this meant there was more to the situation. "Maybe they'll all just think it's about you," she tried, fishing for any hope that it may just pass unnoticed.

Quinn shook her head, "It's possible," she admitted hesitantly, "but I doubt it, and people are always looking for fresh gossip." Little did the girls know it was only going to get worse.

_**Kurt**_

"_So today I'd like to talk to you about pregnancy risks and STD's," the overly chirpy woman claimed._

"_I'm gay," Kurt told her flatly._

"_Right," the woman looked down at the note pad in front of her and scrubbed something out, "so just STD's then," and continued smiling._

_**Santana**_

"_Do you know much about contraception?" she asked flashing a set of pearly whites at the snarling Latina._

"_Do I look like the kind of girl who can afford not to know about contraception," Santana spat back, indicating to her body "besides, I'm currently dating a girl, sort of."_

"_Well then, you take care sweetheart," the woman's person didn't falter for a second._

_**Mike**_

"_Have you experienced much sexual activity lately?" she asked the sullen teen boy._

"_The girl I have a never ending love for, is seeing someone else," he told her sulkily._

"_Well you never know, she may break up with him at some point, and then you'll need to be aware of your bodily urges," the woman went along with the high school obsession._

"_The someone else is another girl," he told her, before standing up and angrily leaving the room._

_**Matt**_

"_Is there anyone you're particularly interested in?"_

"_Yeah, but he's in love with a girl whose in love with another girl, who I used to date, so it's never happening," he rolled his eyes._

_**Tina**_

"_Do you have any questions about the act of sex?" She tried, her enthusiasm starting to wane._

"_Yes actually, have you ever had sex with someone in a wheel chair, I mean, not in the wheelchair, I mean someone who's paralysed?" she asked hopefully._

"_Uhh, no."_

"_Well what use are you? I know about everything else, I just need to know the logistics for this particular scenario."_

_**Quinn**_

"_Are there any…"_

"_Already pregnant."_

"_Right, well, do you have any questions about that?" she offered half-heartedly._

"_Yeah, like what could possibly induce early labour, say at like, 7 months," she paused, "so I could, you know, like, avoid those things, or something."_

"_Perhaps you should talk to your doctor about the pros and cons of a C-section."_

"_I did, he said that the scar is more noticeable then any scarring form vaginal tearing, but my boyfriend is a giant, and I don't want my pelvis to break, or become some sort of baby trapper for his enormous offspring."_

"_Yeah, you defiantly need to talk to your doctor some more, I'm a counsellor, I do feelings."_

"_Well in that case, my feelings are that you're not very useful," and she stalked out of the room._

_**Finn and Noah**_

"_Do you have any concerns about your sexual development?"_

"_Well, I, uh, anything I say here is private, right?" Finn indicated to the walls of Miss Pillsbury's office that was for the time being the office of their visiting psychologist. "Cos I wanted to know if you could give me some advice on umm, how to improve my, umm, performance," he coughed, as if trying to cover the last part._

"_Yes, our conversations are completely confidential," she assured him._

"_Ok, cool, because, my girlfriend and I have never really, you know, done it," he explained hesitantly, "but this one time we were in her hot tub, and she was, you know, sitting on my lap, and my board shorts were, you know," he leaned forwards to whisper, "open, you know?"_

"_Yes I do believe I know," she responded, trying her hardest not to sound condescending._

"_Right well, I kind of, umm, we were making out, and then I sort of, uhh, well I…"_

"_HE BLEW HIS LOAD," Noah yelled from out in the hallway, he shrugged as the other teen turned to glare at him. "Dude seriously, hurry up, I don't wanna sit out here anymore, I'm bored, I could be in Miss Carpenters English class right now," he yelled through the glass whilst miming big boobs. His hand snapped up suddenly to point at the other teen, "don't tell Rachel, or I'll tell Quinn about your interesting discussion," he threatened._

"_I'm gonna go," Finn told the woman sitting across from him, "thanks for your help," he told her sheepishly when she tried to intervene._

_He walked out into the hallway and after a few moments of glaring at the other boy in the hall he disappeared._

"_I don't need to talk to you," Puck said as he stuck his head in the door, "I only talk to chicks I wanna score with, or my girlfriend," he looked confused for a moment, "I mean I __**used**__ to only talk to girls I wanted to score with, __**now**__ I just talk to my girlfriend."_

_**Rachel**_

"_So do you have any issues that you want to talk through, anything that's discussed in this office stays in this office," she told the youth dryly._

"_Am I the only student you're talking to? Because if I am that's not very subtle," she asked quickly._

"_No, you aren't, but seeing as you are here, is there anything you have concerns about, any current predicaments you're in?" She asked, looking down at the form she had in her hand with the word __**pregnant**__ in bold under the 'medical information' subheading._

"_Oh, which other students are you talking too?" Rachel leaned forwards._

"_I'm not at liberty to divulge student's names," the woman responded, already aware that she wasn't going to be doing any counselling for this particular student either._

"_I don't need names," Rachel assured the woman hopefully, "if you could just tell me if they have anything in common, are they all girls? Oh, are they all in the celibacy club? Because I only ever attended one meeting, and that was before Quinn got pregnant," she assured the woman._

"_Not the celibacy club." _

"_Wait? So it could be a different club?" the cogs in Rachel's brain were turning, "OH MY GOD, I saw Kurt being pulled out of class this morning, is it the Glee club? Because that is even less subtle, I can't believe this!"_

_**Figgins**_

_She stormed out of the office, past Mercedes and Artie in the hallway and marched down to Principle Figgins office, "these students are impossible, none of them want to discuss any real issues," she told the stunned man._

"_But you are a professional, you are supposed to be the best youth counsellor in all of Ohio," he argued._

"_Well these kids are, I don't know, they skeeve me out, their all very angry, and over developed for teenagers, I'm done," she said finally before excusing herself and leaving._

"There is no way this is coincidental, I mean the only kids to be interviewed by the sex lady were glee clubbers," Kurt said as he and the girls stood at Tina's locker outside the dark but not deserted choir room.

"I know, I mean really, did they think we wouldn't find it odd? There is no way this is all about Quinn, because I mean hello? She has been getting tubbier for weeks, and the school hasn't said anything,"  
Santana gossiped loudly.

"Wait, so someone else is pregnant?" Brittany asked, clueless as usual.

A chorus of, "no," was let out in exasperation, before all the girls suddenly stopped and looked around at each other suspiciously.

"I mean, no one is?" Mercedes didn't know whether to finish the question, "right?" she added, making sure.

Another chorus of, "no," and "I'm not," was let out before all the girls smiled again in relief.

"OH MY GOD," Kurt suddenly let out, "RACHEL," he said.

"Really? I know that she and Puck have been sort of together for a while, but this is Rachel we're talking about," Tina reasoned.

"She has been spending a lot of time with Quinn though," Mercedes pointed out, "maybe they're like, baby buddies or something," she said, face alight with new hope of scandal.

Inside the dark choir room a glaring Noah had a hyperventilating Rachel pulled into his chest, distracted from a light make out session by the discussion outside they had stood and listened as the others guessed their secret. Knowing that even without proof the school would be crawling with the rumour by the next day.

He didn't meet her at her locker after school like he usually did, she waited an extra ten minutes before finally deciding to go outside and check if he'd left without her, after their day, she wouldn't be shocked if he'd been distracted and forgotten about her.

She made her way out into the parking lot and spotted his truck where he'd parked it that morning, as she approached the vehicle she could see him sitting in the truck, looking distracted. He turned to look at her when she opened the door and hoisted herself up into the cab, "sorry I took so long," she told him delicately, "I wasn't sure if I should wait for you like usual," she explained.

"Yeah," he said, shaking his head as if to wake himself up a bit, "sorry about that," he told her as he leaned over to plant a kiss on her cheek.

"It's ok," she assured him, "are you?" she asked, "ok I mean?"

He waited a while to answer her, "I have to tell my mom," he told her finally, not giving her a chance to ask why he went on, "she has a PTA fundraiser meeting on Saturday morning, some nosey kid is gonna tell their mom, and then one of those prying bitches will ask her something about the pregnancy, and I'd rather tell her myself," he told her.

"You could just tell her it's a rumour, no truth to it," she tried to think of a way to get him out of this.

He smiled at her appreciatively, "she won't believe me, c'mon Rach, this is me, my mom knows me pretty well." He rubbed a hand over his face, "really, I mean, she might not even be that shocked," he sounded almost hopeful, "but even if she is, I'd rather get to explain it to her properly," her reasoned.

"I'm sorry that you have to go through all of this for me, I mean your mom was never supposed to know," she said apologetically.

"Berry, you have to stop, this isn't for you," he said exasperatedly, "we," he indicated to the two of them, "are doing this for Finn and Quinn, so stop stressing, I'll bite the bullet, and in seven weeks it'll be over."

She nodded acceptingly, "do you want me to be there too?" she offered, "I know I would have felt better if I'd had someone with me when my dad's found out," she insisted.

"Yeah ok," he nodded, not needing as much convincing as she expected, "besides, if you cry a lot, she might not yell as much," he smirked.

She rolled her eyes, but smiled back at him, "manipulator," she chided.

"Bleeding heart," he shot back, chuckling "you want me to take you out to dinner?" he offered.

She gave him a confused glance, "I thought we were telling your mom?" she asked.

"Nah," he shook his head as he put the truck into gear and began to back out of the space, "she has to work an early shift tomorrow, so she has to go to bed early, tonight isn't a good night, I'll tell her tomorrow," he explained. "It's going to suck having to go home and act all normal, she can always tell when I'm hiding something, so dinner?" he offered again.

She considered it for a moment, before giving him a sly look, "I have a better idea, why don't you have dinner at my place, and I might even be able to convince my dad's to let you stay over," she offered. "That way you won't have to see her at all until tomorrow after school," she elaborated.

He considered it, "sure, I mean, you don't think your dads will have another inquisition waiting, do you?" he clarified.

She paused to think about it, "I don't think so, I think it'll be fine if because we haven't given them any preparation time."

"Ok, I guess it can't be too bad," he agreed.

"You realise you'll probably end up sleeping in the spare room though right?" she said it casually as if she'd prefer it the other way, but honestly, if her dads insisted she probably wouldn't fight them on it. The first time he'd stayed over, they hadn't been involved with each other and sex wasn't an issue, but now that they were, it was. She knew from her own experience and from general gossip that 'taking it slow' was not his style and she knew he'd been quite respectful so far, but he was a guy, and she didn't know him well enough to be able to read his true intentions.

"Or I could leave, and then sneak back in," he winked at her before turning back to the road.

She tried not to wince visibly, she'd hoped he wouldn't think of that option, "Yeah I guess."

Sensing her hesitation he quickly offered, "Or I could just sleep in the guest room."

"What?" she asked, confused by his random offer.

"You know, if you don't want me in your room," he explained, he was a stud, he understood that she might be scared she wouldn't be able to control herself around him.

She blushed, "no it's not that…" she tried to explain.

"So you do want me in your bed?" he knew it wasn't nice to play on her insecurities, but sometimes it was too easy, and he had every intention of making it up to her later, besides, she was cute when she squirmed.

"I guess… I don't know… it's sort of" now she was rambling, "umm, I mean you can if you want, I guess that makes more sense, seeing as you already have."

He laughed a little, "Is there a reason you don't want me to sleep in your bed?" he asked her.

"What?" her head snapped around, "I just said you could," she tried her hardest not to sound as panicked as she felt.

"Yeah, but you don't want me to," he opposed.

"I didn't say… its fine, you can sleep in my bed."

"No."

"What do you mean no? You just asked to," now she was really confused.

"But you don't want me to," he was getting exasperated.

As was she, "I didn't SAY that though."

"Why don't you want me to sleep in your bed?" he asked her again.

"I didn't SAY I didn't want you to…" he interrupted her.

"Yeah you said that already, but you don't want me to, which is fine, I just wanna know why?" he told her calmly.

She gave up, "I don't know," she said lamely.

"Yeah I don't buy that," he teased her, "you're Rachel Berry, you know everything."

"I do not," she argued back incredulously.

"Yeah you do," this was going to turn into a child's conversation.

"No I don't."

"Yeah you do."

"Ughhh, you can be so, incommodious," she spat at him, and his eyebrows shot up.

He laughed, hard, and it seemed to piss her off because she huffed and turned to look out the window, "you know you use bigger words when you're agitated?"

"Yeah, my daddy says it's a stress reaction," she told him matter of factly.

"You wanna hear my theory's?" he asked suddenly.

"About my big words?" she turned back to look at him.

"No, about why you don't want me to sleep in your bed," he offered.

She huffed, "fine," she finally conceded.

"Ok, it's either that you're still worried about making your dads madder, or you're worried I'll make a move and you won't be able to resist my incredible charms," he told her smugly.

"Do you ever listen to yourself talk? You're possibly the most obnoxious person that I know!" she told him.

"Oh c'mon, I'm not that bad," he laughed when she turned and scoffed at him, "it's all joking Berry, you know that, I am well aware that you'll tell me to stop if you want me to, you do it all the time," he pointed out.

She blushed, she thought she'd been getting more comfortable with him, letting him touch her more, apparently not, if he thought she was blocking him all the time, "sorry," she offered.

"Huh?" he asked, it was his turn to be confused.

"About stopping you," she elaborated.

"Why?" he asked, still not understanding why she'd apologise for something like that.

"Doesn't it bother you?" she asked him meekly, the whole topic made her quite uncomfortable, and even though she knew she didn't have to, she felt a little guilty for not giving him what he wanted.

"What?" he was so casual about the topic, "not having sex?"

He could see her blushing more, "yeah," she confirmed.

"I dunno, sort of," he told her honestly, she couldn't hide that it annoyed her a bit, when she turned to face him he could see she was a bit shocked by the answer. "I mean, I like sex, and I'm good at sex but I don't wanna make you do it if you don't want to, that's just an asshole thing to do," he explained, "besides I can take care of myself for a while," he told her with a smirk.

"What is that supposed to..." and then she got what he was talking about, "eww, that's, gross," she said, not being able to come up with a better explanation.

He laughed heartily, "seriously? You know all guys do it, right?" she made a sound of disgust, and it was just too funny to pass up, "you know Jacob Ben Israel probably thinks of you every time."

"OH MY GOD STOP," she yelled, having a hard time not gagging just at the thought, he couldn't help but laugh harder.

When he'd finally calmed down he turned to her again, "so if I don't groap you too much, can I sleep in your bed?" he asked.

"Sure I guess, if my dad's agree," she compromised.

"But I could just sneak out and come back…"

"No, no more lying, I'll ask them, they might say yes," she told him decidedly.

"No lying?" he asked her, "you have noticed that you're dads think your pregnant right?"

"I said no **more** lying," she pointed out.

After a bit of silence he decided to drum up some conversation, "you know girls do it too," he changed the subject back.

"Wha...? Oh, right, well sure, I suppose some do," she agreed.

"Do you?" he asked, knowing full well the question would fluster her.

She turned bright red, "we weren't talking about me," she responded.

His eyebrows shot up to his non-existent hairline, "was that a confession?" he asked.

"What?" she stuttered, "nooo," but she only went a brighter red.

"Oh THAT is a lie, I can tell when you're lying," he teased her, and she turned to look out the window again, "you just said no lying Rach, c'mon, fess up," he baited her.

"I was talking about lying to my dads," she grumbled without turning to look at him.

"Yeah well, if they ask, you probably should lie about that, poor guys don't need to know what their baby girl is doing in her spare time," he chuckled.

"Ughh, you're mean," she told him as she turned and hit him in the arm. When they pulled up at the next red light, he leaned across and placed a kiss on her cheek, still beaming like an idiot, "what was that for?" she asked him.

He shrugged casually, "cos I like you," he said simply, and it made her smile, "and cos you're way hotter now," he smirked, and she rolled her eyes, whist trying her hardest not to smile at the pseudo compliment.

It wasn't until 10:00 that evening that the issues of their sleeping arrangement came up again, when they'd gotten home from school, she'd insisted they do homework, before they had dinner, which had gone much more smoothly then it had the other night. Her dads had made a couple of comments about how it would have been nice to have gotten some advance warning, but aside from that it had been a fairly pleasant evening, albeit a little uncomfortable. After dinner she'd insisted he watch some horrible movie with singing, and he'd done it cos she sat nestled between his legs on the couch, and he could see down her shirt the whole time. Also maybe a little bit because he knew it would make her happy, though he'd never tell anyone that, but when the movie was finished and it was time to go to bed, he had to give her a bit of a shove to get her to ask.

"Um, Daddy?" she asked when she walked into the kitchen, even though they were both there, she asked the father who seemed to have warmed to Noah the best. "Would it be ok if Noah stayed the night?" she asked, quickly adding a reason, "we're telling his mom tomorrow and he's kind of nervous about it," she tried to appeal to their emotions.

Both her father's looked at each other for a moment, "yeah I guess, you know where the spare linen is, you can make up the guest bed," her daddy offered and then turned back to the wok he'd been washing when she came in.

She glanced back at Noah, who looked a bit disappointed but shrugged and turned to walk towards the hallway where all the bedrooms were, he didn't turn back around until he heard her speak again. "I'd really like it if he could sleep in my room," she wasn't whiney, or pleading, she was just honest, and she hoped that they'd see some of the maturity they'd told her she'd need to have a baby.

All eyes were on her again, Puck stood in the background trying not to look too hopeful, and both her father's considered her carefully. "In future were not going to have sleepovers on school nights," her dad warned her, and she nodded in agreement, "but tonight, if you want him to sleep in your room that's up to you," he allowed.

She smiled in appreciation, "thanks dad," she told him, "good night," she said to both before kissing each of them on the cheek and walking across the room to where Noah stood.

"Goodnight, umm, thanks for dinner and everything," Puck offered and both her father's nodded as if to accept the thanks.

When she'd brushed her teeth and gotten changed and told him that he had to sleep in a t-shirt as well as his boxers, they'd finally settled into bed. "Thanks for letting me stay here tonight," he told her quietly, rolling over to wrap an arm around her body and pull her closer.

"That's ok, I like the company," she admitted.

"Me too," he agreed, "plus, your bed is more comfortable than mine, although not quieter," he commented before wriggling around so that the wooden slats under her mattress groaned in protest.

"Stop that," she hissed while he laughed, she hoped her father's wouldn't hear the noise, "just go to sleep will you," and he did, it only took him about 15 minutes and he had drifted off. She on the other hand lay awake, watching him sleep, and feeling guilty (no matter how many times he'd told her not to) that tomorrow was going to be one of the worst days he'd ever had, she took comfort though, in the fact, that she would be able to be there for him like he had been for her.

As she finally fell asleep, she let her mind wander over their past couple of weeks together, so much had happened and so much had changed, and even though a lot of things sucked for the moment, she was glad that she had gotten to know the softer side of him, because he made it worth it.

**Please Review and let me know what you thought!**


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